INSIDE THIS ISSUE:
Richard Kostelanetz
Karyn M. Bruce
Duane Locke
Lyn Lifshin
Rich Ives
Chris Lord
Anton Gojcaj
Donal Mahoney
Laszlo Slomovits
Alan Britt
A. J. Huffman
Bhisma Upreti
Ali Znaidi
Paul B. Roth
Joan Colby
Rexhep Shahu
Catherine McGuire
Michelle Bailat-Jones
April Salzano
Kufre Udeme
Jane Butler
Jennifer Burd
Peycho Kanev
Joanie Freeman
Jennifer Burd &
Laszlo Slomovits
Frederick Pollack
Fahredin Shehu
Holly Day
Serena Wilcox
Ndue Ukaj
Running Cub
Fred Wolven
Allison Grayhurst
Rose Mary Boehm
Michael D. Long
Jim Davis
Christopher Dungey
Bobbi Sinha-Morey
Jason Ryberg
Douglas Polk
Janine Canan
Ann Arbor Review
is an independent
International Journal & ezine
Copyright (c) 2013
Silver Grey Fox
All rights revert back to each poet.
--editor / Southeastern Florida
------------------------------------------------
staff:
Francis Ferde
Silver Grey Fox
Running Cub
Fred Wolven
Submissions via e-mail:
It writes to you in the silent
scrawl of tree branches weighted
with snow. The backyard creek
finds the oldest path on earth
as it winds its way past the 1920s
dairy barn, shuttered and still
standing, braced and beamed,
its builders never believing
they'd ever be gone.
MIGRATION
She always got the work done--
always organized, practical,
taking care of us kids, the home,
nose to the grindstone,
good at everything--
she even had a knack
for making play look like work.
All the while she took
my life into her hands,
called it her own. I've spent
years learning how to take it
back, swearing I'd never take
care of her. Now, her memory
going, her grip on me gone,
a tenderness I've never felt
comes pouring.
Today I lost count
of how many times she asked
what day it was and whether
she'd eaten breakfast.
We paid her bills,
filled the pill boxes, crossed
the calendar's blank squares
to the next time I'd visit.
At the door, we hugged again
and again. And then--her ears,
still sharp, caught the calls of geese
just cresting the rooftop.
Their wingbeat, and the trusting
aim of their southward V
filled her, and for those moments,
her eyes were miracle-sky.
"Look--look!" wonder smiled
her whole body. And through
loss, pain, and age, came
a gift I'd never seen before--
how she could fly like that.
Jennifer Burd, Ypsilanti, Michigan