My cabin is hung with pelts to dry/
the air thick with gore and loneliness. 

It sits in a shadowy copse/pines
giving shelter when I need it most. 

When the rains come I burrow down
beneath my blankets and think of her/ 

bobbed head like the underside of a
crow’s wing/pale throat a beacon in the dark.

 I ask myself if duty and forgiveness
can ever hold hands or 

if she will close her eyes
when the future comes for her. 

The box sits empty/
awaiting its awful freight/ 

glimmering with a handful of jewels. I think
that if I had made the box  

it would smell of the pines surrounding
my home/pipe tobacco/warm straw. 

It would welcome her heart
with a sort of kindness.

Amanda Crum

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Amanda Crum is a writer and artist whose work can be found in publications such as Eastern Iowa Review, Blue Moon Literary and Art Review, and Dark Eclipse, as well as in several anthologies. Her first chapbook of horror poetry, The Madness In Our Marrow, made the shortlist for a Bram Stoker Award nomination in 2015; her latest, Trailer Trash, will be published by Finishing Line Press in early 2019. She currently lives in Kentucky with her husband and two children.

Artwork: Rob Woodcox
Website: http://robwoodcox.com/

02 Dec This entry was published on December 2, 2018 at 12:06 am and is filed under 33 (December 2018), Archive, Poetry. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.