Amberlee Carter Poems

Somewhere a hand is reading out loud-
an old bible, a weatherworn journal.
Recording the daily assaults –
memorizing rain and shielding eyes
...

something so simple,
if it really were,
we'd not be mentioning it now.
...

He pinned me between his hips and his couch-
knelt over enough to kiss the blade of my back,
and to lap his tongue in the stream of sweat
meandering down the xylophone of my spine-
...

what straddles morning and
milks color from the dawn,
rushes down empty streets
into coffee-shops for kicks-
...

Love was understanding: the battle rages on
inside my head, inside my lungs, even after
love has gone.
...

I have a wound that seeps-
it’s ugly and unkind; I beg it not to speak-
it haunts me still, so I lay quietly,
stitching my lips together, so that my tongue,
...

I remember now,
how my dirty ideas stood on the threshold of your eyes
and how you asked me to clean the words
before you could let them inside.
...

Days like this day: no Manna from heaven-
my mother’s voice is the rain
tapping against the windowsill because
I left the window open last night, all night
...

For one so full of sorrow and war-
I think I should have been born in Russia during
a dynasty of tyranny that brought to it’s people a great depression.
It would make more sense because then I could explain why I feel so cold, most of the time-
...

' hello amber, how've you been? '

'fine, for the most part- been a rough year thus far'
...