Marc Swan
Skin and Bone
In the gathering dusk
before our eight-hour drive
from Grande-Digue to Maineone more task remove the hide
from the skull of the road kill
she picked up earlier this week…On the back deck of our Air B&B
Leatherman multi-tool in hand
she works aged skin away from boneI take pictures of the progress
soon the skull is cleaned
upper and lower teeth gleam…not sure of the age of the fox
been sidelined for many seasons
but clearly a sugar free diet
Quicksilver
Sound level is high
as are most of the patrons seated
along the bar. It’s a friend’s birthday
and we’re having pizza and beers
catching up on our evolving lives.
I tell him I try to write about current
events, but it’s quicksilver the way
life slips through my fingertips. Changes
from day to day, and sometimes less,
on decisions that will impact all of us.
We talk of the election and holding
onto our fragile democracy— the wars
and uncertainty on many fronts: Ukraine,
Gaza, Lebanon, Sudan, Iran, Taiwan
and the list goes on an on. A respite
when food arrives then talk shifts
to the slippery slope we climb craving
justice that never seems to arrive.
Marc Swan lives in coastal Maine. Poems recently published in Sangam,
Chiron Review, Sandy River Review, Crannóg, among others. His fifth collection,
all it would take, was published in 2020 by tall-lighthouse (UK).