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Sarah Hinlicky Wilson

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Grays: A Poem

January 24, 2023 Sarah Hinlicky Wilson

Call down
            not winter’s cold
            not winter’s dark
            but winter’s palette

Light gray of shadows on snow
Medium gray of about-to-storm sky
Dark gray of the bones of sycamore trees 

Yellow-brown beech leaves cloaking the trunk object
Pokeweed berries staining the snow object
Holly trees declaiming Christmas object
Cardinals getting caught object
                                                        to grays
                                                                  not ambiguous but absolute
                                             object
                                                        to grays
                                                                   and lose

Light gray, the bleak landscape of heartbreak
Medium gray, the satisfaction at survival
Dark gray, the pleasure of repentance

(Words and photos by Sarah Hinlicky Wilson. This poem was first published in the Spring 2009 issue of Ruminate. It appeared there under the title “Shades of Gray,” but due to the subsequent publication of a certain horrifically popular book series—and I mean that in both senses of the term—I thought it wise to rename my poem here.)

Tags poetry
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