Saga

Becca Klaver | Poetry

She lost her faith
then her husband.

If you’re lucky
Kate says

offering me half
a peeled cucumber

loss lets you live many lives
no longer afraid.

Soaked in a more
equatorial light

I can see clearly
the need

to free myself
of this terrible

devotion.
To lose faith.

He was going to be
a pastor

said he replaced
piety with me.

I was going to be
his savior.

Why can’t girls be
gods on earth?

Great is not the same
as forever.

Who knew LA would be
my convalescence!

I think, floating
on my back in the pool

I’ve snuck into at the
Saga Motor Hotel.

For a long time
I thought I’d never be

and then I believed
I could be

and now today’s
the day

I know I’ll be
okay.

I don’t seem sad here—
(write it) I feel happy.

My initiation
soon ends.

I can taste it
way out west

where first I became
someone else.

Becca Klaver is a writer, teacher, editor, scholar, and literary collaboration conjurer. She is the author of the poetry collections LA Liminal (Kore Press, 2010), Empire Wasted (Bloof Books, 2016), and Ready for the World (Black Lawrence Press, 2020), as well as several chapbooks. Midwinter Constellation, a book co-written with 31 other poets in homage to Bernadette Mayer’s Midwinter Day, was published in 2022. As an editor, she co-founded Switchback Books, is currently co-editing the anthology Electric Gurlesque (Saturnalia Books), and has created pop-up projects such as Women Poets Wearing Sweatpants and Across the Social Distances. She lives in Iowa City, where she works as Program Manager of the Iowa Summer Writing Festival.