A Sapling’s Tears

I carry an anthology in today’s everything bag.

I pull it out while waiting for the next thing:
coffee,
the nurse to call me in,
the bus to come,
the sky to fall.

Reading it exponentiates shared stories,
raising internal voices, outing me into
the crowd,
the transport,
the enshrined clouds.

I find myself glancing from page
to people, and back again.
I think how crowds
oblige me to gawk, wonder
what each person’s story is.

Absorbing each bark-sacrificed
to-be-told tale, bound together.
Tendrils remain pulling, calling
me to wander; to whom in the crowd 
does this one (or that) belong?

We could each as easily be
the story-less face
in the crowd,
as the face-less story
on the page.

Such wrenching compassion grows from
the simple carrying of a poetic storybook
made from stolen bits of pulp. Remains
of a sapling’s elders, whose tears now dampen
the forest’s floor.

The well-seasoned writers’ gifts:
the inked feather in flight,
soaring from our condensations,
rooting us back to The unsoiled Home.

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artwork by Turkish surreal digital artist Aykut Aydoğdu, please take the time to view his stunning work

Hokis

Hokis is an American poet of Armenian descent. She is Founder and Senior Editor of Headline Poetry & Press and a regular contributor to Reclamation Magazine. Hokis is widely published digitally and in print. Her poetic memoir "OnBecoming: Aesthetic Evolution of This Rising Ancestor" is available on Amazon or through your indie bookstore. For more, visit hokis.blog.

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