Paint Chips
by Catherine McGuire
Ah, Golden City! Clearfield!
Oh, exquisite Peace River,
Lemon Grass, Simply Red!
I once sought your dance cards
mooned over your swatch
fell into your vibrancy
your promise of rooms
so rich I’d swoon walking in the door.
I believed you; I planned a life
of every hue, an orgy of color.
I hoarded paint chips
spread them like tarot
read my future, a can of paint away.
As with most dreams, I barely touched you –
a few pale walls, no scarlet courage
and now painting is out of reach.
Taking out your stained-glass triptych
I remember now the passion, the hope.
I thank you all – every color,
even khaki – for making my soul
dance.
Bio: Catherine McGuire is a writer/artist with a deep concern for our planet's future, with five decades of published poetry, six poetry chapbooks, a full-length poetry book, Elegy for the 21st Century, a SF novel, Lifeline and book of short stories, The Dream Hunt and Other Tales. Find her at www.cathymcguire.com
Morning Chores
by Ed Higgins
This morning’s cold fog straddles my back fields.
Like a cautious horseback rider it eases toward
the barnyard, enshrouding the barn and outbuildings
in grey mist. I am doing morning chores:
speaking as I am wont to my hens just released
from their overnight lockup into the chicken yard.
I’ve tossed a small kitchen bucket of scraps
from last night’s dinner leftovers for them.
There’s always a mad scramble when I let them out
rushing to snatch up tasty bits. Some hens
have stayed in nest boxes, already laying or keeping
an egg from the cold. The fog’s beginning to retreat
to the trees lining the creek bisecting the farm.
Two young calves slip out of the shrouded field heading
for the barn where I’ve put out a double scoop of grain
and screening pellets. I cut the strings on a bale of hay
dropping a couple of flakes into the feeder. The rest of the cows
are still invisible out in the far field. I turn back toward the house,
needing a second cup of coffee. The morning haze slowly lifting away.
Bio: Ed Higgins' poems and short fiction have appeared in various print and online journals. Ed is Asst. Fiction Editor for Brilliant Flash Fiction. He has a small organic farm in Yamhill, OR, raising a menagerie of animals—including a rooster named StarTrek. A collection of his poems, Near Truth Only, has recently been published by Fernwood Press, 2022.
