Poetry | August 05, 2019
Poetry: David Kirby
David Kirby
The Woman in the Wall
The housekeeper is about to disappear into the room next
to mine just as I say, Wait, tell me a housekeeping story.
She’s a college kid with a summer job who doesn’t care
that she’s probably breaking the housekeeper’s code
of ethics, so she says, Sure and tells me about the guy
who was doing drugs in 204 last year and got it
into his head that his girlfriend was inside the wall,
so he tore the wall out with his bare hands. Okay,
it was the drugs. But what else was he trying to say?
That the world doesn’t work. Sometimes your baby
If you are a student, faculty member, or staff member at an institution whose library subscribes to Project Muse, you can read this piece and the full archives of the Missouri Review for free. Check this list to see if your library is a Project Muse subscriber.
Want to read more?
Subscribe TodaySEE THE ISSUE
SUGGESTED CONTENT

Poetry
Dec 11 2020
Poems: Jamaica Baldwin
Forbidden Let me go back to my father in the body of my mother the day he told her, Having black children won’t save you when the revolution comes.… read more

Poetry
Dec 11 2020
Poems: Janette Schafer
Elixir When I was five, I discovered alcohol in abandoned red cups scattered about the Green House, the first place we lived in Detroit after Venezuela. Dad rolled blunts… read more

Poetry
Dec 11 2020
Poems: Ronda Piszk Broatch
I’ve Got an Asinine Affinity (Infinity?), a Clumsy Love Song The bees of the heart weave stillness into a conversation. String theory is smaller than the bees in the honey… read more