Today's poem is by Joni Wallace

Sleight of Hand
       

A shadow holds no light on the moon.
        My father steps into his own, light-less.
He puts an arm in, a foot. To disappear.
        As in he vanished into the trees.
In this case, into earth's shadow, his most
        elegant trick, the empty stage
                                emptying still.

Once, as a child, I dreamed the moon into my room.
        An underneath hollow where
a rabbit ghostly-slept, on the surface a sea
        where a father came to be.
A boat, a sail, shadow puppets on the land.
        Leaves, hands, a shoe,
man in a measure: you.

Tweet

Copyright © 2023 Joni Wallace All rights reserved
from Landscape With Missing River
Barrow Street Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission