RADIO
The trees are engulfed in dreams
I’m dreaming
of their anatomy ghost chests
which are so real I can feel
their hearts of light on
my shoulders.
On this day, nothing was said
and so I step outside
and explode into the light
because it feels like the beauty
is launching itself through the air.
We are OK. And the snow has stopped
after the coldest March on record.
I touch the flames painted on my cheeks
and listen and when I listen
to March I hear how every other day
there is a record-breaking
something. And this is always bad.
Every other day you lose half
of something you forgot you had,
so prepare to be happy.
I’m heading home to you,
threading my stray dreams
through my hair, little wicks
ready to be lit, or not. I braid myself
with the inner-life of trees.
Don’t find me, please, rumors of disaster.
Without the stars there wouldn’t be us.
NOTHING WILL STAY
Not the cracked sidewalk that snakes around
this town. Not mother, not father.
Not the one thing they were when they were together.
Not what I was when I was younger.
Not the knowledge I once had of how to be
alone. Not my brother in his house,
on his computer, alone. Not his dog.
Not that kind of devotion.
Not the tiny bulbs I push into the ground
or the earth I pat around their green heads
slick as butter knives. In a ground
of shell, sand, and bone I wait for them
to take life, but nothing will stay.
Not even the apparition of you
making breakfast, the sun not yet out.
There’s nothing more to know, you say
and you turn to add more salt.
Make our life that moment where
the bread is already on our plates.
The moment I think it’s too much
You’re saying it’s just enough.
...
Tasha Cotter's first full-length collection of poetry, Some Churches, was released in 2013 with Gold Wake Press. Her work has appeared in or is forthcoming in NANO Fiction, Verse Daily, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. You can find her online at www.tashacotter.com. She lives and writes in Lexington, Kentucky.