Contributor: Douglas K Currier

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Remember we put that jigsaw puzzle
we found together, together, winter,
that winter we had nothing – no money,
no friends, no invitation to parties,
no holiday cheer. Behind the towels,
upstairs closet, just sitting there waiting
for us to assemble, and didn’t we?
It took us a month of random studies,
of minutes stolen from daily despair.
We conferred; we worked; we pieced together
a sky, some buildings, a bull, onlookers,
balconies, cobbled street and the danger.
In the end, we knew what of us we lacked
– two pieces of sky, a deep shadow, face
of an onlooker, looking on, this haunch
of bull, tensed to push that bulk forward into
the running crowd, completely panicked.
Pieces missing – all puzzles should have them.
We’re still looking -- two pieces of sky, deep shadow,
face of an onlooker, and a piece of
haunch, tensed to push us a little forward.


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I am a former college professor who has been published in Laurel Review, Dominion Review, The Café Review, and Fish Stories. My work appears in the anthology, Onion River: Six Vermont Poets. I live in Burlington, VT.