by Carole Greenfield
Candles in blue votive holders sputter, mutter as their light
shutters, flutters, flickers while demons snicker in shadows
and corners as warnings come thicker and faster, tonight six of us
cluster round the table, flustered, attempting to muster our courage,
our wits in starts and fits, each of us realize it’s happened before,
as students of history. we know the score and still we sit frozen,
the chosen are we, some speak of escaping or trying to flee,
it feels like each day is a gift I’ll look back on after the rift
that divides life in this moment from what is to come;
I hope for some peaceful, swift ending, my soul drifting
upward like smoke from candles in blue votive glass, their last gasp
a whisper, a spark, a silent swirl upward into quiet dark.
Carole Greenfield grew up in Colombia and resides in New England, where she teaches multilingual learners at a public elementary school. Her work has appeared in Still Point Arts Quarterly, The Plentitudes, Amethyst Review and other publications.
January House Literary Journal 
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