by Nina Forsythe
Is this what it’s like?
You go to work, make dinner,
order new reeds for your clarinet,
replenish the bird feeder,
you hear worrisome news
from hundreds of miles away
and stock up on rice, toilet paper, coffee.
And then one day, just as the cherry trees
are coming into glorious bloom,
the air is exploding
and tanks are coming down your street.
Nina Forsythe is a freelance editor, knitter, gardener, and City Council member in Frostburg, MD. She has an MFA from Bennington, and her poems, translations, and reviews have appeared in Nimrod, Kestrel, Chiron Review, Taproot, Prairie Wolf Press Review, Loch Raven Review, and the anthology Knocking on the Door, among others. She's a three-time winner of the Backbone Mountain Review Poetry Prize, and she hosts a monthly Coffee with a Writer.
January House Literary Journal 
Leave a comment