The News
In the morning, the sun paints Venetian stripes
on my bedroom wall. When a cloud passes,
the pattern fades then returns, a camera
going in and out of focus. The brighter the sun,
the darker the shade: that’s what I like best.
That, and the way we are unable to stop
the stream of information
we open our eyes to each morning, turning toward
the nightstand to read the big and little hands,
waiting for the pattern of stripes to tell us,
as if we were fish turning upstream
and opening the pages of our daily gills,
what kind of life lies waiting.
Poem by Kim Roberts. Kim Roberts is author of two books and editor of The Beltway Quarterly, an online journal based in Washington D.C. This poem first appeared in The Broadkill Review.
The News
Warning—sudden calamitous events
have stunned the most responsible women and men
but broadcasts undust old narratives again.
I think it better to assess my house:
promises honored, self-regards undone.
I find in silence improvement, slightly though,
and so that old battle with myself. I go
and ride that road past the gallery of masks
to reach a field where ancient ghouls and gods
welcome my second self, who knows his roots,
and wrestles the world within, demanding order
and life, while worldly fortunes rise and die.
Poem by Gregg Mosson. Gregg Mosson is the author of Season of Flowers and Dust, and an editor of this blog.
