Emma

Clint & Emma Photo by Sydney Keller Photo

 

 

She is a beautiful fragrance

born on the cusp of summer

 

like a flower pressed

to release the heart of a bloom.

 

She holds the charm

of sunlight in her golden-brown hair

 

and the air sparkles around her

smile, and my son’s, delighted to be her groom.

 

Two flames, soon one,

lit since he danced in my womb,

 

with my hand rested there in prayer

for him—she, the answer born of God’s perfume.

 

 

© 2025 Jennifer Wagner

 

Photo by Sydney Keller Photo 

 

Perfect timing at What’s Going On? as today is my son’s fiancée Emma’s birthday.

Happy birthday, sweet girl!

 

Coyote

 

Today I write poems.

The hard ones.

The worst and best to write.

 

Regret at how I hurt you

as you were so little

while my fears were so big

and so looming.

 

I am sorry.

I am fool enough to think

these words may be enough.

 

Looking out the window

at the fog that got us both,

I know this is how you, feel, too—

lost, unseeing.

 

I don’t know when you will understand

and shake off your winter coat

and run, orange fur escaping into the sun

and meadows I kept you from.

Go now, I pray.

 

Your bruisings I will hold in my heart, I hope,

if allowed,

so you may be free

 

from this tumbleweed field

where I birthed you,

where my eyelashes are becoming weighted down

by dust.

 

Go, go, and remember the best of us.

 

 

© 2024 Jennifer Wagner