by Sarah Stockton
The boy wants racoons to live in the house
wants to let the dogs run wild
I’m trying to hold space like my elders taught me
for the lives people build in their minds
populated with warcraft, romance, riches
Let’s make three piles, I say to the boy
Keep Give Away Bury
his keep pile fits in a pocket
the giveaway pile, on a barge
we cast away the rest for burial
a minute for goodbye before
we let the dogs run wild
Sarah Stockton is the EIC of River Mouth Review. Her first full-length collection, The Scarecrow of My Former Self: poems of illness and grace, will be published by MoonPath Press in February 2024.
Emerge Literary Journal 