By Stuart Dybek
Fire ran horrified
from its ashes.
In the afterglow,
cinematic shadows fled
from flesh and blood.
Scars appeared,
followed years later
by their wounds.
Blinks of red
dinged relentlessly,
but there was
nowhere to stop
for the train
pulling its wreckage.
Poet Bio
More By This Poet
Their Story
They were nearing the end of their story.
The fire was dying, like the fire in the story.
Each page turned was torn and fed
to flames, until word by word the book
burned down to an unmade bed of ash.
Wet kindling...
Clothespins
I once hit clothespins
for the Chicago Cubs.
I'd go out after supper
when the wash was in
and collect clothespins
from under four stories
of clothesline.
A swing-and-a-miss
was a strike-out;
the garage roof, Willie Mays,
pounding his mitt
under a pop fly.
Bushes, a double,
off the fence, triple,
and over, home...
More Poems about Living
Spring Snow
A spring snow coincides with plum blossoms.
In a month, you will forget, then remember
when nine ravens perched in the elm sway in wind.
I will remember when I brake to a stop,
and a hubcap rolls through the intersection.
An angry man grinds...
At the Equinox
The tide ebbs and reveals orange and purple sea stars.
I have no theory of radiance,
but after rain evaporates
off pine needles, the needles glisten.
In the courtyard, we spot the rising shell of a moon,
and,...