Lisa Dordal is the author of the poetry collections Mosaic of the Dark; Water Lessons, a Lambda Literary Most Anticipated Book for 2022; and Next Time You Come Home, a Lambda Literary Most Anticipated Book for 2023. A recipient of an Academy of American Poets University Prize, as well as the Robert Watson Poetry Prize, she holds both an MFA in poetry and an MDiv from Vanderbilt University, where she is a writer in residence. She lives in Nashville, Tennessee.

Broken Arm

by Lisa Dordal

Like you hold a baby, the nurse said. Hold your arm
like you hold a baby.
And I held it that way.

My fingers fat with pain I couldn’t feel
as I breathed come back onto my suddenly strange skin.
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