Carla Drysdale
Picton, Ontario, 1964
You aren’t really dead. I know
because you doze on the armchair
in the farmhouse
rug warms the wood floor;
even the wicker lamp
snores as the bulb fans light
over the toddler who plays
at your feet. She feels herself
to be part of everything,
her imagination wider
than your arms
held out to her
when you awaken–
for now you nap
and she plays within
the frame of this trust
which will sustain her
for the rest of her life.
Carla Drysdale is the author of the poetry collections Little Venus (Tightrope Books, 2009) and Inheritance (Finishing Line Press, 2016). Her poems have appeared in Spiraling, Public Pool, Cleaver Magazine, PRISM International, The Same, LIT, Literary Review of Canada, Canadian Literature, The Fiddlehead, Global City Review, and Literary Mama, among other journals, and in the anthology Entering the Real World: VCCA Poets on Mt. San Angelo. In May, 2014 she was awarded PRISM’s annual Earle Birney poetry prize for her poem, “Inheritance.” Born in London, Ontario, she lives with her husband and two sons in Ornex, France. To learn more, visit www.carladrysdale.com.
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