How light can play tricks with your soul
Because of the double layer of plexiglass
I can see my own ghost
sitting primly
twice:

facing me on the seat of a backwards bus,
eyes blank, open, vacant,
the lights of the street passing through them

as we go. I see the pale light on her
shoulders, the long glimmer of blond hair,
the straight line, the round of her nose,
the tops of her ears shining like gold coins;

the shadows under her cheekbones surprise me.
These high lines are plagiarized,
poor copies of my mother’s face.

Of all this ghostly double’s form,
only her mouth stands out solid
from the dim tan of her body
and does not fade over the heads of other passengers.

Her lips are perfect–the top trapping shadows,
the bottom round and pink. I wait for her
to speak, to kiss me even, or to sing.

The second ghost sits a little ahead, smaller,
a blood-red garnet on her finger
curled around the first ghost’s throat,
grabbing her bag like an old lady on a bench.

But I am not old; if this is my ghost, never will be.
I wonder why there are two. What does it mean?

Two see-through sets of shoulders,
two pairs of vacuum eyes,
and one mouth?

—M. Christine Benner, Summit, New Jersey, is a graduate student in the English Literature department at Drew University.

Sanctuary

I sit in rank
silence, scraping away
hope of escape
with reason and duty.

I intend my faith and
resentment basely,
like livestock intend
obedience to death.

I taste the cruddy
water of salvation,
savor it
and swallow and spit.

Let me stand and leave
this solitary
multitude
for open loneliness.

Let me crawl on
tender knees, beneath
the pews, to violent
piercing prayer.

Let me spill this stagnant
cup of peace
in which I’ve slipped,
drowned for camouflage.

And I will learn to
worship slow, burn
my barren, own
my cluttered pain. And find

divine proximity
outside my blood-red walls.

—M. Christine Benner

The Poet Gives Up
Perseverance is a virtue,
as it develops all those other things,
but what about giving up?

Can’t I be sainted,
in honor of my astounding wisdom,
for the day that I laid down?

I say we,
who realize the full value of quitting,
beatify the election of end.

—M. Christine Benner