Dream of Myself
looking in a mirror
swathed in black lace
human shape translucent
and pulsing like a jelly-
fish heart and womb
shining through like the Visible
Woman’s wondrous as
the Piglet octopus
with its crown of tentacles
and saucer eyes or
the pocket shark shaped
like a palm-sized sperm whale
the caterpillar fringed
like a Mardi Gras float
or Uncle Walt marveling
at how his ankles bend
Never worry about beauty again
You too are God in drag
Barbara Ungar’s Save Our Ship won the Snyder Prize from Ashland Poetry Press and was named to Kirkus Reviews’ Best Books of 2019; it also won an IBPA Ben Franklin Award and was a Distinguished Favorite of the IPA. A chapbook, EDGE (named for the EDGE lists of Evolutionarily Distinct and Globally Endangered species), has just arrived from Ethel Press. Prior books include Immortal Medusa; Charlotte Brontë, You Ruined My Life; The Origin of the Milky Way; and Thrift. A professor at the College of Saint Rose in Albany, NY, she lives in Saratoga Springs.
