Two Poems
Nicole Emmelhainz How Can We Keep Such Comfort Safe Early morning settles beneath windowsills, rests in sidewalk cracks, scurries between trees, hovers on the road’s edges. I see him there, stiff, damp, cold, dead. Hit and run, but who cares about one tom cat? I lean my bike on the chill and dare a closer look. Body broken, neck twisted he stares perpetually over a corn field, snapped stalks bent down toward solid Ohio ground. Twelve years of farm life, of feeling death and birth all around doesn’t prepare you for kicking your cat into the ditch, for listening to the grass rustling as his body tumbles down, for feeling the dawn exhale. Mother’s Wisdom First day of Spring, Mother reads the Farmers’ Almanac to me: Clover protects people from spells of magicians, the wiles of fairies. Clover brings good luck to those who keep it in the house. Pluck a four-leaf clover at first Spring dew, rub it on your freckles. They will fade. Next morning, before sunrise as sparrows peck over the gravel drive, in search for bugs, the clover bed waits for me, dew-drizzled, spider web-speckled. My pajamas drag damp earth to the search for the perfect clover that will wipe my face clean, give me luck, protect me from bullies. It's not to be found this vernal equinox. Instead, two regular clovers clumped together, swept over my nose, cheeks. From the kitchen, Mother watches me I do not know she’s there. She blames red cheeks on chilly air. |
|

About the Author: Nicole is part of the 6th generation to grow up on a family farm in central Ohio. This land drifts into her poetry often. She lives in Newport News, VA with her husband and cat, and is an Assistant Professor of English at Christopher Newport University. She spends most of her time teaching, talking, and writing about writing.