Tricia Knoll

Añjali Mudrā

Our Zoom host smiles: assured, welcoming, introducing three poets to read. The host asks us to mute. Ice cubes in my strawberry soda clink. My dog chews at her one white foot. The furnace rumbles.

The first poet reads nature lyrics that cascade down from a highway scene to his solitary stance on an island’s seashore. Next, a woman doubts god. Her uncapitalized god wears anacondas coiled on her wrists. Last, a woman offers antidotes to loneliness in drawn-out memories of Vietnam and Alaska. 

I scroll through the faces attending. Forty white people. All over the age of 50. We tap our emojis of thumbs-up and hearts. Of all the little faces in little boxes, three senior citizens appear to sleep. Two women are propped up in their beds. We place our hands together in front of our chests. A sign of respect. 

out night’s window
howling wind claws the elms
an owl's soundless flight

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About the Author

Tricia Knoll is a Vermont poet. Her work appears widely in journals. She has published nine collections of poems as either full-length books or chapbooks, including The Unknown Daughter (Finishing Line Press, 2024), a combination of fantasy fiction and feminist history.  Knoll is a contributing editor to Verse-Virtual and maintains a daily haiku practice of noticing.

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