Three Poems by Barbara Alfaro

Royal Street 

 

Abruptly, the bars and the strip clubs 

end and another part of Royal Street 

 

begins, long and lined with  

haphazard houses and trees 

 

pirates kissed girls beneath.  

Two walked in this suddenness. 

 

She said how warm a night it was, 

had he seen the chandelier 

 

in that last house, and “It’s 

impossible to fall in love in New York.” 

 

And the trees whispered and warned one another.

   

 

Magic 

 

 

The moon maintains her magic 

as easily as a child smiles.  

I woke to find moonlight 

across the center of me. 

Thrilled and silly with delight,  

I stayed still as a window 

in a Tuscany castle. 

 

The moon maintains her magic

   

 

Here I am

 

 

upside down, inside out 

like that crazy robin 

pecking at his image 

in the window, mistaking 

it for an enemy. 

 

Here I am in a place 

I never thought I’d be.  

Daughter of the stars, 

penniless as the moon, 

 

learning to speak again  

learning to walk again 

learning 

   

 

Barbara Alfaro is the recipient of a Maryland State Arts Council Individual Artist Award in Playwriting and winner of the IndieReader Discovery Award for Best Memoir for Mirror Talk. Barbara’s poetry collection Catbird is published by Finishing Line Press.