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New Knees~ By Jan Ball

1/26/2017

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Bionic as she might be with her new 
knees, she is not yet as omnipotent 
as the huntress Diana who is posture 
perfect pulling back on her bow while 
she aims an arrow; neither can she 
swim from Havana to Key West 
without a shark net like Diana Nyad 
at sixty-four.

At the airport she requires a full 
body search due to the titanium, 
arms crossed over her head like 
a criminal whose car the police 
are searching; then the security 
guard lightly runs her palms along 
her detainee’s hips explaining each
insinuating gesture with memorized 
phrases, “Now I’m going to pat 
the inside of your thighs, now I’m 
going to touch your glutes,” to make 
sure that extra padding is attached.

Once at the condo by the beach,
she removes her clothes, then 
squirms into the blue elastic flowers 
on her bathing suit, her knee scars 
like vines, while she presses her 
sweaty fingertips against the dresser 
top to balance herself as she struggles 
to yank the suit up, clumsily alternating 
her legs that once took long hikes 
but still don’t co-ordinate since 
the surgery, into each elasticized leg 
opening. 

At last, she reaches the white sand 
she has longed for through anesthesia 
and physical therapy, and walks along 
the congratulating waves again. 


Author Bio:
Jan Ball started seriously writing poetry and submitting it for publication in 1998. Since then, she has had 215 poems accepted or published in the U.S., Canada, India and England (hopefully Australia soon). Published poems have appeared in: Atlanta Review, Calyx, Connecticut Review, Main Street Rag, Nimrod, Phoebe and many other journals. Poems are forthcoming in: By&By, Caveat Lector, The Courtship of Winds, Medical Encounter, The Sacred Cow and Straylight. Her poem, “my face emerges from my face,” was second runner-up in the Spring 2010 contest issue of So to Speak. Her poem “carwash,” won the 2011 Betsy Colquitt Award for the best poem in a current issue of Descant, Fort Worth. Her two chapbooks, Accompanying Spouse (2011) and Chapter of Faults (2014), have both been published by Finishing Line Press and are available on Amazon. She is a member of The Poetry Club of Chicago.

Ball has has taught ESL at DePaul University in Chicago until recently. She lived in Australia for fifteen years with her Australian husband. Our two children, Geoffrey and Quentin, were born in Brisbane. She is a twin to Jean Helmken and a Franciscan nun for seven years. When not writing poetry, teaching ESL, working with her personal trainer, going to book group or traveling, she and her husband and like to cook for friends. These background experiences infuse her poetry.
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