by Darren Demare
EMILY AS THE SECOND WINTER
I pressed the bleakness of Ohio
to my face
& I breathed so deeply
that I swallowed old wounds
to create new wounds
& Emily, she watched all of this
beneath a blanket she made,
next to a fire she started.
I, too often, force myself
to experience all of Ohio
all of the time. Emily, she works
in concert with Ohio
to be comfortable in every season.
She is a lighthouse
in a land without real tides.
We need her, despite never
having really needed her at all.
She is our map to a better world.
EMILY AS THE FOG FLARES
Spiked
& hung
up by the arriving
temperatures
of this morning
in the context
of last evening,
I ate
four apples
with Emily
in our sedan
parked under-
neath the black
covered bridge.
We could have
sang songs
while we waited
for the scene
to clear for us.
We didn’t.
EMILY AS SHE TOOK SOME OF OUR THINGS TO SELL
We pulse with our past
& that is fine most of the time.
That doesn’t mean
we don’t find some joy
in burying our fraying bits
in the arms of strangers
for real cash. Emily always
knows best which parts of me
to put on that card table.
Darren Demare
I am the author of eight poetry collections, most recently Two Towns Over (March 2018), which was selected as the winner of the Louise Bogan Award by Trio House Press. I am the Managing Editor of the Best of the Net Anthology and Ovenbird Poetry. I am currently living and writing in Columbus, Ohio with my wife and children.
Artist: Guy Catling