All the maidens
had gone extinct.
The debutantes too.
She found herself
in this place, alone,
a Bardo stage set
for a film
that would never be made
about women
who scorched revolution
into the earth
while kneading forgiveness,
for themselves, and the men,
who skirted the borders
of psychic endangerment.
#43 from Untitled Film Poems
Image by Cindy Sherman
She believed
there was a place for her,
a venerated quarry,
or wedge of corner,
somewhere
that wouldn’t be
overlooked
by the gossamer sentience
of light falling.
#42 from Untitled Film Poems
Image by Cindy Sherman
Cased
in lucid glare
she modeled herself
as a pin-up
sacrifice
to the ribbed shadows
that dyed
her silence.
#41 from Untitled Film Poems
Image by Cindy Sherman
She turned, obliquely,
to reframe her perspective—
Maybe one last chance?
#40 from Untitled Film Poems
Image by Cindy Sherman
As if in a dream,
or mottled gloam,
she found herself bailing
on the small needy child
with grotesquely long
tapered fingers–
she found herself leaving home
to an unmarked plot
and its numberless ghosts.
#38 from Untitled Film Poems
Image by Cindy Sherman
It wasn’t her in the book,
but it could be.
Why couldn’t it be?
If she modeled herself
correctly,
assuming the strictest code
of due fiction,
she could rival
the heroine between the covers
and rest easy,
knowing others were escaping
into the story of her life.
#34 from Untitled Film Poems
Image by Cindy Sherman
John Biscello 