"Sorceress" (Stained Glass) by Debbie Striker

In literal French: a sorceress, a witch, also slang for any older, unmarried woman. In French custom, a sorcière is also the name for a simple band worn as a safeguard above a wedding ring.

     It curls,
a thin slice of dun moon, its pressed lips
un-made-up against the stars' hoyden brass.

     And lines,
a tin wrinkle marring the stone's set face,
a pucker of grey band capping the light's fall.

     It sets,
flash status against the spinster's slow fade, last aunt,
the mystery within the sealed attic's rat-a-tat-tat.

     Then pairs,
two cards pulled side by side from the arcana,
the diamond's naive reach, the queen's argentine pall.

BIO: Elline Lipkin recently received her Ph.D. in Poetry from the University of Houston. She has poems forthcoming in The Texas Review and Crab Orchard Review. Email: elline@aol.com