When I’m painting people in clothes,
I’m always thinking very much of naked
people, or animals dressed. – Lucian Freud
Memory is an ill-lit room
where nothing is discarded,
an anteroom or attic where
detectives do their research
and recycle what facts don’t fit
today’s cold case but just might
tomorrow’s. Under the gaslights,
immune to your own tears, you tear up
silk scarves you once wore as bandana tops
into gauze bandages. Married muses
like you, of a certain age and wounded,
are called by certain men naked not nude.
By Richard Collins
I have lived in Cucamonga and Venice Beach, Bakersfield and Bucharest, Baton Rouge and Blagoevgrad, New Orleans and Old Mexico, Swansea and Sewanee, where I now direct Stone Nest Zen Dojo. I have published over 100 poems, half of those in the past few months. I used to teach literature and creative writing; now I teach Zen students how to sit and breathe. My daughters are my pride and joy. My dogs keep me grounded. In Search of the Hermaphrodite (Tough Poets Press, 2024) is my memoir of living in London in 1980. https://toughpoets.com/
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