Originally from the U.S.A., Jane Joritz-Nakagawa now lives and works as an associate professor at a national school of education in central Japan, where she teaches courses in gender, American poetry, educational psychology, multiculturalism and English. Her poems have been in dozens of literary journals including New American Writing, ACM, 580 Split, Tinfish and others. Her first poetry book, "Skin Museum" was published by Avant Books (Tokyo) in 2006.
Not wanting to be an open book
We hide, like forgotten clothes, the passion
we consumed, until the house of which we recently have tired
collapses before we fully escape it. The remains of this life,
waiting like a meal, are pushed
aside for some semblance of predictable help
that are the issues (for us)
as the clothes for invisible bodies or souls
as if beneath the skirts and blouses there were no bodies
a sad, unruly sexiness
images of a radical
lives and civilizations change depending on actions across
dust, grit and probably asbestos fanged
with wings the size of a small plane
I hoped was a very innocent voice screaming