Kathryn J. Stevens
It comes to this
moonlit sill
the collapsing wings
of a gypsy moth
In wartime Prague on a stone bench my great-grandparents sit for their last portrait
strands of gray
not even the wind
can find words
my great-grandfather stares directly into the lens, this dirt-poor farm boy whose quick tongue spun land into houses, houses into gold—one gnarled hand rests on the head of his old hound, the other grips a cane
my great-grandmother shrinks into her coat’s musty fur collar, stares in bewilderment at the camera, once the prettiest girl in town, but by then…
changing skies
the desolation
of polished marble
About the Author
Kathryn J. Stevens worked in marketing communications with IBM and before that with a division of The State University of New York at Albany. Her poems have appeared in Modern Haiku, Frogpond, Ribbons, Haibun Today, cattails, contemporary haibun online,The Heron’s Nest, KYSO Flash, MacQueen’s Quinterly, and Scarlet Dragonfly Journal. She lives with her husband in Rochester, New York.