The Innisfree Poetry Journal

www.innisfreepoetry.org

by Tod Ibrahim

DEPTH OF SNOW

When I was a kid in Brockport, we'd get
so much snow you could make angels by lying
on your back and drawing your arms from your sides
together over your head. While the others
would flop down in the powder and flail
their arms into wings, I'd stare at the brittle blue

bright above the hushed white. Shadowless,
I'd stand there, frightened, fearing
the depth of snow, afraid of darkness, afraid
of stillness, afraid if I lay down
I'd be swallowed cold. After a while I'd let go . . .
and for a brief moment not be able to move.

It's the same feeling I have now when I'm waking,
can't move, and think I've died.


INVENTORY: WORD WORKS BOOK TITLES

Eight pale women
bodies we were loaned
flesh that was chrysalis.

Crow's eye view
following Fred Astaire
stealing mangoes.

Judging the distance
toward desire
looking for divine transportation.

Upon waking
the stones remembered
the last heat.

Altered in the telling
a diamond is hard but not tough
stalking the Florida panther.

Black book of the endangered species
counting bad names for women
woman from Memphis.


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