I bow my head and you label the pose wilting, assume my tongue is bone dry. Wine is not a cry for help, water seldom a pool to bathe. Call my mood blue then step aside. Thaw turns the slope into a causeway home. A lone break in the shade bursts with flower, the buzzing joy from a swarm of bees. I’m on my knees again, this time forging a path through grass, blades bent over in forgiveness.
Beth Oast Williams is the author of the chapbook Riding Horses in the Harbor (Finishing Line Press, 2020). Her poetry has been accepted for publication in Leon Literary Review, SWWIM, One Art, Fjords Review, Dialogist, Invisible City and Rattle’s Poets Respond, among others, and nominated twice for the Pushcart Prize.
