three poems

elichvar
Oct 14
2 min read

by Alice Bingham Gorman

The House of Eighty

From this threshold,

where I stand firm,

I wonder

if I am visible

through the windows

of my eyes.

Can you see

the many rooms?

Can you tell

that nothing

has been lost,

nearly everything

has been used,

and a few things

transformed?

Do you see

the light in my living room

still shines—

and I am still at home?

Daffodils in December

Impossible, you say,

but I stand firm.

I hear the voices

call me:

A burst of yellow trumpets

blowing the defiance

of spring

into the bassoon mouth

of winter.

Slender green stems,

clarions of the spirit

ringing bells

of recognition.

Madness, you say,

as you turn away.

Yet here I am—

alive with expectation.

Empty Pool

While standing midstream

I asked,

do you love me?

You said no.

I blinked

at my dreams

bobbing in the ripples,

disappearing downstream.

I reeled

in the line I had

cast out to you,

the line lying slack

in a pool of still water.

I turned and headed

toward the other bank,

grieving for the life

we would never share,

for the person I realized

was never there.

Alice Bingham Gorman is a graduate of the Naslund-Mann MFA in Writing program at Spalding University (’05). Her work has been published in Vogue; O, The Oprah Magazine; Salon; The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature; The Louisville Review; and others. Her first novel, Valeria Vose, was published in 2018. Daffodils in December: Poems from an Unexpected Life was published by Fleur-de-Lis Press in April 2025.