Yvonne Morris is the author of Busy Being Eve (Bass Clef Books) and Mother was a Sweater Girl (The Heartland Review Press). Her work has appeared in Beach Chair, Cathexis Northwest Press, Eclectica, ONE ART, The Galway Review, and elsewhere. She earned an MA in Mass Communication from the University of Kentucky.

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The Big Bump

This morning, the sun breaks through after
long winter days, the longest in years since
I was young and snow-wise and remember
rising to open the door and gauge the hill
next to our house in Michigan. But now I
observe two eager boys pushing their sled
down a slick driveway across the street, hear
their squeals and think how laughter feels—
air rushing past the tongue, torso jittering,
eyes squeezed tight yet seeing more perhaps
from a twist, a sudden swerve or shift in course—
then Wheeeeeee flying over the last big bump.

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Cessation

The knapsack I carried home
following four months in a commune
held seventeen cents, two cigarettes,
a copy of the Baghavad Gita,
one lost ring, two goals:
to go back to where I came from,
to never be the same person.
I stopped smoking instead.

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(Previously published in The Goldenrod Review)

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Bridge Beyond

I walked to the end of my street where concrete
meets meadow and the bridge beyond, picked

a dandelion, that was you—dent de lion—
in French will do. Threw it away yet it flew back

so I sipped its brew in pastures woozy with yellow.
Then wielding my cup, between once silvered hope

and the well-fed truth, I drank the moon until
the white of its eye ran me through. My scar

became the meadow and the bridge became you.

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(Previously published in The Festival Review)

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