Holly Day

Five Poems

Revision

on the timeline, I’m a map of wrong turns
detours—15, should have buried myself in computers
like my friends, at seventeen, should have buried myself in schoolwork,
taken advantage of my early college admittance, at nineteen
my father asks, you still think you’re going to be
an astronaut? at twenty, lectures on how
real writers spend eight hours a day writing, not three
twenty-one, my boyfriend asks me how I can justify
spending so much money on postage to
send out manuscripts when I don’t have anything
in the fridge.

I hear myself giving speeches on missed chances
to my children, to a son almost out of the house and I
know I’ve heard these lectures somewhere before, I hear myself tell my daughter
about how once upon a time all I wanted out of life was to
someday push an ice cream cart at the zoo
have a big, fat orange cat like the one sitting in my lap
children who loved me, and I think,
no, that’s not exactly true.

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For Now

every Halloween I get to see
a cavalcade of police cars in my yard, oh Midwest
police are so strong and steady, I know my
neighbors are glad to see them there. Oh no,
my best friend on TV just found a gun

now you should knock first before coming
in here. I know, I should have warned you that we were considering gun options
but lost all track of time in the shopping, the choosing.
I know, you and I, we were once so close we could have
exchanged skins, identities, but this new
friendly friend of mine, beamed flat and
bright on the screen from a station somewhere else
is company enough. He’s more than enough.

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The Things I Know

I read headlines about cannibals living in
plain sight, drunk driving accidents,
children bringing guns and knives and drugs to school and Continue reading “Holly Day – Five Poems” →