Winter Crows

by Patrick Reeds

Winter white sky 
and squalling snow. 
All day long crows 
have been roosting 
like notes on a staff 
in the pencil black
trees on my block. 
Two weeks into February 
and I am still eating 
candy from Halloween. 
What’s the best time of year 
to scatter a loved one's ashes? 
For mother we chose the fall. 
For my father, a Tuesday. 
I used to write a lot of letters 
but I don’t anymore. Now 
once or twice a month I have 
a nightmare. A dream 
that reminds me of all the names 
I know but never say out loud. 
Because sometimes the voice
in my head sounds all tinny
and far away like it’s coming 
from a transistor radio and sometimes 
it’s lush and harmonic like a piano chord 
played with all ten fingers.

---

Patrick Meeds lives in Syracuse, NY and studies writing at the Syracuse YMCA’s Downtown Writer’s Center. He has been previously published in Stone Canoe, New Ohio Review, Tupelo Quarterly, Atticus Review, Door is a Jar, Guernica, The Pinch, and Nine Mile Review, among others. His first book, The Invisible Man’s Tailor, is available from Nine Mile Press.

Read More