Denial
I sit in this room
breathing your sadness,
knowing
you want me to say
yes, there is a God,
meteors won't fall from the sky
and that tumors
won't eat your closest friend
but the dinosaurs died, didn't they,
and sirens wail every night.
A coward, I fold my arms,
listen to the seas race past
our window towards land
where some other
man cries over lost dreams
and the way the moon
reflects off the water
when the winds finally settle.
Pris Campbell
©2002
To see an alternative graphic presentation of this poem, click HERE, then click your back arrow to return.
Accepted for publication in Verse Libre,
summer 2003
This poem also took second place out of
149 entries entered into the free verse section of the Poets of the
Palm Beaches annual 2003 poetry competition.
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making space
our house overflows with killed promises
and I think of days when
I still took kisses for granted
like 'amen'
at the end of a Sunday prayer
or
the purr of a cat
when offered a nuzzle under the chin
we both know
yesterday dies
to make room for tomorrow
but you haven't yet learned,
as I have,
that a heartbeat
can be revived
by the curve of an arm,
the outreach of a palm.
Pris Campbell
©2002.
Accepted for publication in the Peshekee River Poetry Journal
Spring 2003
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