Terence Degnan
Praying for Snow
I keep looking up
for the first frog
peering around corners
with a mirror
for the proverbial cows
I’m having ghost pains
for the other shoe
or a missing leg
in a forthcoming war
never mind the shame
of having once thrown seeds
in the naked sky
just to see if burn marks
would materialize
like black stars
in her linoleum floor
this hour isn’t a pair
of red socks in the delicates
it’s not dead crops
in the bulge
it isn’t a rancid lake
or the stub of a summit
it is my daughter’s look
on a trip
home from Pennsylvania
it’s the detour we took
to see an abandoned tunnel
it’s the sound she made
halfway through a mountain
as her hands glimmered in the blackness
it’s the snow that fell
straight through the dogwoods
when we exited
—Submitted on 04/08/2020
Terence Degnan has published two full-length books of poetry. He is a co-director at the Camperdown Organization which was created to increase access to publication and education as well as promote agency for underrepresented writers.
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