Paula Bohince
Johnstown
When a girl is raped, and left
crumpled in a tree stand
wearing only a muzzle
of ice, mermaid hair frozen
in weird angles,
we, in Johnstown, start talking.
Say how after the great flood,
casualties were found as far
as the Ohio,
people in trees, in chimneys,
so that the governor ordered
all water between
be dragged, putting to bed
many cold cases.
We visit the small museum
we drive past most days,
pay two dollars to watch
a newsreel, relearn how
experts knew it was coming,
buy tee-shirts with a picture
of bodies caught in a sprawl.
We go home and cut her out,
mail the grain of her eyelids,
wet ink of her hair,
to relatives who’ve left.
Here in Johnstown, we drift
between the missing and dead.
Paula Bohince holds an MFA from New York University. She teaches at the
City University of New York and New York University. |