corey mesler
She Opened Her Dress
She opened
her dress as if
it were a
suitcase, a suitcase
into which she
had moved
all her things, leaving
behind all that
she had known,
the home and family
that simultaneously
supported and thwarted
her, a suitcase she
was now setting
down for the first time
in a long time, at
the end, finally, of
an extended journey,
one that she
had little planned for,
which was both
good and bad,
a suitcase out of
which tumbled all her
possessions like
the treats and threats from
Pandora’s tumid
and gnostic box.
COREY MESLER has published in numerous journals and anthologies. He has
published two novels, Talk: A Novel in Dialogue (2002) and We Are
Billion-Year-Old Carbon (2006). His first full length poetry collection, Some
Identity Problems (2008), is out from Foothills Publishing. His book of short
stories, Listen: 29 Short Conversations, will appear in March 2009. He has been
nominated for the Pushcart Prize numerous times, and one of his poems was chosen
for Garrison Keillor’s Writer’s Almanac. He has two children, Toby, age 19, and
Chloe, age 12. With his wife, he runs Burke’s Book Store, one of the country’s
oldest (1875) and best independent bookstores. He also claims to have written
“These Boots are Made for Walking.” He can be found at www.coreymesler.com.