Runoff
leaves everything to the imagination:
splotch the ice, splice the light,
remake the spirit…
Just get on with it,
doing what you have to do
with the gray palette that lies
to hand. The sun’s coming soon.
A future, then, of warmth and runoff,
and old faces surprised to see us.
A cache of love, I’d call it,
opened up, vernal, refreshed.
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Disclaimer
We do not accept unsolicited submissions. American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2021 by Sidney Burris, “Runoff” from What Light He Saw I Cannot Say, (LSU Press, 2021). Poem reprinted by permission of the author and the publisher. Introduction copyright © 2024 by The Poetry Foundation.