Lucia Cherciu
The New Owner
The first thing he did after moving into his new house
was take out large clippers and snap off the vines
as if lifting the anchor on a ship. Drained by the long
wait time closing, packing, moving, he had
imagined himself cutting them for months, the ones
twisted around the trellis, the white pergola
on the patio. Some had knotted themselves through
the fence and he almost clipped the wire in his assiduous
zeal. Some had split a crevice into the garage wall.
Tenacity brittle, resolve unabashed, only after
he was done and had pushed the cut off vines
into large trash bags lined on the curb, did he find
the catalogues left by the previous owner: lavish
Concord, Muscadines, Marquis, Neptune, Glenora.
Bio
Lucia Cherciu is a Professor of English at SUNY / Dutchess in Poughkeepsie, NY, and she writes both in English and in Romanian. Her newest book of poetry, Edible Flowers, is forthcoming from Main Street Rag. Her other books of poetry are Lepădarea de Limbă (The Abandonment of Language), Editura Vinea 2009, and Altoiul Râsului (Grafted Laughter), Editura Brumar 2010. Her poetry appeared in "Connecticut Review," "Connotation Press," "Cortland Review," "Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and the Environment," "Memoir," "Off the Coast," "Paterson Literary Review," "The Prose-Poem Project," "Spillway," "Oglinda Literară," "Pro Saeculum," "Salonul Literar," "Timpul," "Hyperion," "Contrapunct," "Astra," and elsewhere. Her poetry has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and for Best of the Net.