Aaron Mangerson
In hopeful dreams I see by day are silent screams I yearn by night.
The warm embrace and a subtle taste of lips flash through my mind.
My faded memories are reclaimed now bristling with luster.
Yet my heart is fraught and dreads the thought; it's all that I can muster.
This maiden fair with golden hair belongs with someone else.
So I toil away until that day I feel just what I felt.
“I'm a 33 year old single Dad trying to work towards a better future for me and my kids. I wrote this poem after bumping into an old flame from high school that kindled some long lost feeling that I had to put aside.”
* * * * * * * * * *
“Toad In the Tub”
By Macy Washow
A tiny toad clings to the mirror above the bathroom vanity.
My still sleep-blurred eyes mistake it for . . .
some type of Florida roach.
Then it leaps . . . how astounding for something so small!
Just a toad, I sigh, amazed at what fear can do.
His eyes bulge, astonished at our encounter.
Relieved to be dealing with toads, not bugs,
I try to capture him in my washcloth.
He watches my hands come near,
then escapes to the tub in two gigantic leaps.
Deceived. The tub is no safe haven but a trap.
He hops from side to side until fatigued.
When he stops in a tub corner to rest,
I seize my chance, swooshing down!
Unaware that in capture lays salvation,
he twitches inside the cloth
until I set him down outside,
where he hops away without giving thanks.
Later I research “toads” and find he is a frog, not a toad at all. But things are not always what they seem.
A toad made for a better poem.
“This is a poem I wrote while in Florida last spring about an unexpected morning encounter. I am retired and live in Lac du Flambeau.”
