KB Ballentine

KB Ballentine loves to travel and practice sword fighting and Irish step dancing: those Scottish and Irish roots run deep! When not tucked in a corner reading or writing, she makes daily classroom appearances to her students. Learn more at http://www.kbballentine.com.

Every Scar Has an Edge

Wind-bruised oaks welcome warbler-kissed dawn,
last night’s Wolf Moon covered with cloud and flurries.
Mounds shroud the bushes, the house,
yard an unbroken desert of white.

My uncle called, haunted by his long-dead wife,
daughter becoming her eternal roommate.
The two of them whispering in his ear,
inflaming dreams, dreams.

But here are the bluebirds, the lark,
night’s elegy on their tongues.
Not every goodbye offers closure.

River birch sluffs its bark as snow dissolves
its damp path to the ground –
and it comes back to this:

a squirrel leaping for a limb,
starlings gleaming near the feeder,
a candle still burning after last night’s storm.