Photo:
I pound the heels of my boots into the concrete:
short thuds under the rattling train.
Ten miles from your hospital bed
commuters rush past me, their eyes
searching the sky to avoid mine,
a thumb of ash across my forehead.
Archaic, too public—the way I cry.
I open my coat to let the wind run through.
If it’s sharp enough, I tell myself,
if it bites hard enough, maybe
I can ignore the gasoline stink
of the miles between us, this grubby corner,
its switching sounds. If it bites sharp enough—
the wind lifts grit into my face.
Zoë Huettl is a poet originally from Chicago, Illinois. She teaches, writes, and studies in Baltimore. Her work has appeared in The Foundationalist and Helicon.