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Breathing snow
You can do it awhile. Air pockets remain,
locked around ice crystals. But not forever —
just long enough to replay the avalanche
rolling over life, sweeping love downhill,
leaving you flattened in white,
no way to reach for sky. If your ears still hear,
eyes are not frozen closed, hand trapped
near face can clear a bit of space,
you may have sufficient time
to listen for swish of metal probes
slicing nearby, promising beams of light.
If tempted to sleep, imagine
a new lover finds you, scoops a place
by your side, lies close. Together,
you breathe hope into deep snow.
Timothy Pilgrim
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(published by the Sue Boynton Poetry Contest, republished by Thick With Conviction; republished in Bellingham Poems, Flying Trout Press; republished in Poetry Walk: The Second Five Years, Poetry Walk Press; republished in Mapping Water, Flying Trout Press; republished by Poetry Pacific; republished 2019 by Better Than Starbucks, republished 2020 by River Poets Journal -- copyrighted Timothy Pilgrim photo: deep, mottled snow, Mount Baker, Washington state) |
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Timothy Pilgrim, a native of Montana and retired university journalism professor living in Bellingham, Wash., is a Pacific Northwest poet and 2018 Pushcart Prize nominee. His poems have been accepted more than 500 times by journals such as Toasted Cheese, Mad Swirl, Cirque, Santa Ana River Review, Windsor Review, Hobart, Otoliths and Prole Press in the U.S. Canada, Australia and the United Kingdom. He is the author of Mapping water and Seduced by metaphor: Timothy Pilgrim collected published poems, which the back cover calls “a 10 on any Richter imagination scale.” |
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