Awake

and with the sound
of birds again
glistening on
the pane, I found
after a rain
magnolia blooms
all pink and bright
on crooked limbs
with the first light-
green inklings of
the darker leaves
as yet to come.
The heart believes
what it believes.
That much seems true.
And up above:
more clouds, smoke-blue
and pallid-gray.
I doubt if they,
heaped up like gauze
on a wet wound
to the pink applause
of magnolias,
could come and come
and yet convey
no thought of you.

• About
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Will Toedtman

Will Toedtman lives in Cincinnati, Ohio.He is the author of The Several World, winner of the Wick Poetry Chapbook Prize.New poems are forthcoming in Able Muse, The Hopkins Review, Dappled Things, and elsewhere.

Also by Will Toedtman (see all)

• First Night - May 24, 2022
• Homecoming - October 30, 2021
• Still Life - September 22, 2019

Author: Will Toedtman

Will Toedtman lives in Cincinnati, Ohio. He is the author of The Several World, winner of the Wick Poetry Chapbook Prize. New poems are forthcoming in Able Muse, The Hopkins Review, Dappled Things, and elsewhere. View all posts by Will Toedtman