Two poems by Anna Weaver

to make like the women/ in short stories and give/ herself a new name

dreams of place

“I have the belief I’ll learn something
in a dream I can’t find out otherwise” –Gordon Weaver
“The Way You Know in Dreams”

when I dream you
it’s not like the others
your voice is your voice
and you wear the face I know
you are never almost someone
else and we are never standing
anywhere almost familiar
never at an edge looking out
no, in my dreams we move around
the big messy middle like
when the buildings go liquid
moving around us as we move
through the rooms until inside
becomes outside and then maybe
a policeman speaks a language
we don’t know or we wait together
for a city bus that never arrives but
nothing needs explaining
not the how or the why
the riddles makes their
dreamlike sense and we
make sense within them
there is no hurry because
these are dreams not of becoming
just being
because you come always
in dreams of place, not time
where there are no seasons
and we are always dressed
just right for strange weather

bookish girl’s last resort

to make like the women
in short stories and give
herself a new name

one that suits her better
one that’s unique
but still easy to remember

which she chose
during the long lonely drive
to the diner in Wichita or wherever

the story ends
and she’s a waitress
again and maybe

the customers suspect
there’s more to her
than the plastic tag

with the simple name
or maybe they just want
another cup of coffee

and to linger at the counter
over a new book
putting off a bit longer

the hard work of making
sense of their own
lives as written

Anna Weaver writes as a former soldier, a lover of flatlands, and a woman “with loyalties scattered over the landscape.” Her poems have appeared in Connotation Press, O-Dark-Thirty, One, and elsewhere, earning nominations for the Pushcart and other prizes. She lives in North Carolina with her two daughters, and has performed her poetry in 29 states and counting.