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Ellen Hirning Schmidt

My numbed tongue glides
over my newly restored tooth.
The receptionist pushes a few buttons
hands me back my credit card.
She tells me to have a wonderful day.
I leave the office all fixed,
get in the car
head home
for lunch.

My finger pushes the radio button,
They are eating grass, the woman reports.
This is Gaza and she doesn’t mean sheep.

Policemen are so often shot
right after unloading
aid trucks. No one wants
to be a policeman anymore.

Some people are blocking the aid trucks
from getting through at all.

Eggs cost 100 shekels, used to cost 7.
There aren’t any anyway anymore.

The numbness has worn off.
I notice my bag
riding on the passenger seat,
credit card lying inside,
finger prints all over it.

—
Ellen Hirning Schmidt received the Helen Kay Chapbook Prize, Connecticut Poetry Society Award, a Pushcart Nomination, and was chosen as a finalist for American Writers Review 2023. Armed to the Teeth, her first full-length collection, was published in 2023 (Antrim House Books). Her work is published widely. Schmidt designed Writing Through the Rough Spots for students across the U.S. and fifteen other countries.

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