cambridge book review

Ruby’s World

Elli Hazit

Staying inside the present helps
Ruby to starve herself
For now, Ruby said, I won’t eat
For now
Just for now
For now, I don’t want to cry, eat, laugh, shout, fight
But I can be elliptical
I can pretend and pretend and pretend at pretending
I can stay inside
Myself

Ruby thinks she’s fat
And Ruby is dying from want of a mother’s love
Maybe
Or Ruby is killing herself
so boys will like her skeleton
Ruby has good bones

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Elli Hazit was born in San Francisco in 1960. She earned her bachelor’s degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and her master’s degree from Boston University. Hazit lived in Paris, France from 1983 to 1997. Her writing has been published in the International Herald Tribune, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, and the Cambridge News. She has also produced radio programs for WORT-FM, Madison. One of her stories, “The Tangerines and the Dogs,” was broadcast internationally on the BBC World Service Programme.

June 15, 2011 Posted by cambridge book review | poetry | Eleven Poems: An Audio Chapbook, Elli Hazit, Ruby's World | Leave a comment