Muddy Bank

Ceridwen Hall

Autopilot

Awaiting snow, the earth is almost colorless.
Then a brief gleam from the pale fields: a silo

or tool. The highway pretends it will never end
so I follow its wide grey pledge. Windmills rest

motionless or turn slowly. Resisting what? Air
this morning is thin and thought-like. Ice covers

the edges of a pond, but not its center. The brain,
likewise, begins to narrow at speed, searches only,

the road, for its next anticipated creek or hillside.

Outdoors

A Witness tries to explain suffering to me—or something
about a God who loves, who therefore punishes. Injustice
and pain must exist; otherwise, what would be the point
of comfort? There’s a glossy leaflet to take, but I let the dog
pull me away and lie about my name because no language
seems adequate in spring. The sun is more light than warmth,
dangerous the way joy is: like sorrow uncontained. Every bud
threatens a bloom; branches wait for the wind to freeze again.

Ceridwen Hall is pursuing a PhD in creative writing at the University of Utah and reads poetry for Quarterly West. Her work appears or is forthcoming in Grist, Hotel Amerika, The Moth, Rattle, Tar River Poetry, and elsewhere.

from The 2River View, 22.1 (Fall 2017)