A friend says she is giving up poetry, and I wonder. Is it like giving up chocolate for Lent, a small sacrifice in service of spirit? Or more like giving up cigarettes, trading stained fingers and yellow teeth for the minty snap of nicotine gum? Or do you give up poetry with a shrug and a white flag, turning over your metaphors and meaning like spent weapons, your words a crumpled ransom note on the ground? How could I give up poetry when it was never really mine? Just some ragged stray that wandered into my yard one day, all matted fur and stark ribs, a breed I never bothered to identify, or pay much attention to, though it followed me from room to room, quiet except for the clicking of its nails on the wood floor, curling by the foot of my bed at night, soft whimpering snores punctuating my dreams. Sometimes I would wake to its warm snuffling breath on my face, other times it would disappear by morning, gone for hours or weeks at a time. At times I forgot it had ever lived with me. But when it would return, scratching at the back door with the faint scent of a foreign flower or the salty green sea in its fur, I was happy to have it back, stroked its silky ears, set out bowls of food and water, hoping this time it might stay.
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Lisa Shulman is a poet, children’s book author, and teacher. Her poetry has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, and has appeared or is forthcoming in Anacapa Review, Inkfish, Kitchen Table Quarterly, Chiron Review, New Verse News, ONE ART, Catamaran, and a number of other journals and anthologies. Her new chapbook is Fragile Bones, Fierce Heart (Finishing Line Press). Lisa lives in Northern California where she teaches poetry with California Poets in the Schools. www.lisashulman.com
© 2025, Lisa Shulman
Halfway Down the Stairs 
This is my experience too—thanks for putting it into words.
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