Massachusetts Impostor
Rose Kelleher

At my approach the hillside bristles.
White needles and black wedges scratch the air:
Cape Codders, cracker boxes, triple deckers
secure in their austere rectangularity.

I'm a fraud, I don't belong here.
I nod at the white cabdriver's diatribe
co-opting his accent; yah, rhyme a homegirl
dancing to a predictable rhythm.

A cartoon leprechaun, a potholed rotary,
a drawbridge yawns, thunders, stinking
of garbage scows and broken mussels,
a forest of slanted masts, and here I am.

In Tedeschi's the cashier snaps her gum.
I recognize the stiff-spined library lady
but she glides past in silent espadrilles
like the boat my father dreamed of.

Made in Minnesota
Rose Kelleher

The picture's clouded by my ignorance, 
so I must conjure up what I don't know: 
white wolves elude the lens, refuse to dance 
for unmanned cameras hidden in the snow; 
and drawling Nordic men, with eyes that droop 
at the corners, watery and white-lashed, puff 
on pipes; while big-boned, silent women stoop 
to lift their loads alone. Their hands are rough. 
And I imagine you as a baby there, 
weaned abruptly, and too early, from 
the breast your mother didn't like to bare,
the house being drafty, and her fingers numb.