Best Poems Written by Roy Hanshaw

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a set of ten thousand eyes in which each individual carefully watches the sky.
the craft of winter is easy enough to master, thus easy enough to recognize. 

during life, people get used to the harbingers of autumn falling into winter; the birds quiet, the unopened cans of soda stop exploding in the car. most notably, there are leaves crunching and grinding underneath the feet of children. adults, like yourself, in particular, get used to the fact that some of the kids are pretty merciless. for example, you and others have to see a child hold a fallen leaf and strip the light-green steam of its discolored vegetation. in fairness the process is clear-cut, there is no damage done, the leaf had already fallen off the tree. acknowledgment does little to the fact it doesn’t bode well in the stomach. 

so, most turn away from the sight; they opt to turn their eyes to the sky. perhaps winter will not come this year, the collection of dead leaves was a mere red herring, there is still plenty of a beautiful summer to be had. they as a community in a specific location just hit a cold patch, that was all, that was all of it really 

you keep that hope in the pit of your being, that hope of the bad things will not start up again. looking up to the sky, filled with that hope, yet feeling oh-so-alone as your peers crowd around you doing the same, feeling the same. a set of ten thousand eyes in which each individual carefully watches the sky. it’s as though the sky itself opens up to chirp. of course, it is not the sky itself, it is merely the sound of a bird taking flight. 

the intake of breath catches you off guard every time. your eyes are still on the sky, you see that bird cross some invisible threshold of the sky, from here to somewhere else and that fledgling optimism drops so fast, launching down your spin, it makes your head spin. if your intake was bad, your cry is downright horrid; the crowd melds behind you, you as its centerpiece, the loud in the collective of quiet denial. 

no one says anything. what breaks the stillness is a flood; flocks of birds pass overhead, though no one has kept their head up to see. 

it's quiet, while you want to be loud, while you do not want this change in which the familiar returns. the space in between your lungs is short, rendering you the vocal minority unable to speak at all, during the moment you want to speak the most. in spite, you think to yourself,

           but I have too much to declare.

Copyright © Roy Hanshaw | Year Posted 2017