https://offcourse.org
ISSN 1556-4975
Published by Ricardo and Isabel Nirenberg since 1998
Two Poems by Miriam Kotzin
Bedtime
Some days I’m too busy to worry
Until I am ready to sleep.
Then I wonder if in the hurry
I missed a date I meant to keep.
The what ifs arrive in a flurry.
Self-doubts pile up in a heap.
All day I felt pressured to scurry,
And now I’m too weary to creep.
The clock by the bedside is blurry.
I count troubles instead of sheep.
A Rabbit and a Priest Donate Blood
One rainy day a rabbit and a priest
go into town to donate blood.
They take a bus. They trek through mud.
The priest is sure he is type B.
The rabbit sighs. “Type B? Type A?
No use guessing. What can I say?”
The young phlebotomist just laughs.
“It’s apparent. You ought to know.
It’s clear to me—you’re a type-O.”
Miriam N. Kotzin is the author of five collections of poetry, most recently, Debris Field (David Robert Books, 2016). Her novel, Right This Way, (Spuyten Duyvil Publishing, 2023) joins a novel, The Real Deal (Brick House Press, 2012), her collection of short fiction, Country Music (Spuyten Duyvil publishing, 2017), and a collection of flash fiction, Just Desserts (Star Cloud Press 2010). Her fiction and poetry have been published in anthologies and numerous periodicals such as Shenandoah, Boulevard, SmokeLong Quarterly, Eclectica, Mezzo Cammin, Light, Lighten Up Online, and Valparaiso Poetry Review. She teaches creative writing and literature at Drexel University.