In Memoriam
by Lynn Thayer
A procession of clouds
edged in mist settles around us
like a wall edged in barnacles,
a fence edged in blackberry brambles.
Everything’s a mouthful here;
long verse of the past
the present wailing her elegy,
berries sweet enough to bleed.
A northern chill canters in
on hooves of familiar horses
& summer, like ancestry
is laid to rest;
beasts lose their reins
clouds loose their rains--
yet still, silently,
the stickered vines age
edged in mist settles around us
like a wall edged in barnacles,
a fence edged in blackberry brambles.
Everything’s a mouthful here;
long verse of the past
the present wailing her elegy,
berries sweet enough to bleed.
A northern chill canters in
on hooves of familiar horses
& summer, like ancestry
is laid to rest;
beasts lose their reins
clouds loose their rains--
yet still, silently,
the stickered vines age
Lynn Thayer is a multidisciplinary artist living with chronic disability in Salida, CO. Her work has appeared in The Closed Eye Open and is forthcoming in Obscura Craft Magazine. Lynn was accepted into Jane Hirshfield’s Advanced Poetry Workshop through Lighthouse Writers Workshop (2024) and selected for the 2024-2025 Poetry Collective manuscript cohort through Lighthouse. See more of her work at www.lynnthayer.com.