Two Poems by Wyatt Townley

Two Poems: Wyatt Townley

The Gift It snows for decades. Even in August the days slide out from under us. First we lose our footing, then our bearings. Then comes the gift.

It has taken a blizzard of years to find in what has fallen what was contained.

The snow of all time wraps everything together through the night, bundling the hedge, the swings, and the sandbox into a gift so heavy it can’t be held.

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T WO P OE M S

What We Hold The ocean is coming for us all night it closes and opens its fist on the shore edging nearer and nearer as we pack to leave we hear it circling back hand over hand we tuck ourselves in folding and rolling our clothes into trunks that fold and roll the ocean is coming for us the water at our heels removes our footprints fills our shoes just as we have filled up houses room after room with more than we can hold we open our hands and books fall out diamonds and knives and the phone’s recurrent goodbye it took only a moment to move from water to air on the life raft of our first cry but it has taken a lifetime to return to where we started and what we are

W YAT T T OW N L E Y

mostly water as we wade the depths we traded breath by breath for sky

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