days of stone

Tag: heart

  • Letter to My Sons

    —

    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    Boys, When the fire comes—and it will—don’t run.Stand your ground. Feel the heat. Know what’s worth burning.Not everything you carry needs to be saved. You’ll be told to move fast, talk loud, win more.Don’t listen to that.The quiet men are the ones you want near when things fall apart. If your hands shake, that’s fine.So…

  • Magpie Morning

    —

    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    Fifty soon.Strange how that numberfeels both heavier and lighterthan expected. I wake before the house stirs.Kettle on.Dogs at my heel—the old one careful on the tiles,the young one waiting for the daylike it might break open just for her. A magpie sings on the powerline,low and fluted—not calling,not warning—just there.Like me. The track behind is…

  • you left before the bell

    —

    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    we were sixteen,all collarbones and restless hands,kicking gravel behind the bike shedslike we knew the world owed us somethingand we weren’t afraid to ask for it. your name lived in my throatfor years afterlike a word I never learned to sayout loud. we never got a proper ending—just a Tuesdayand a late noteand a suddensilence.…

  • Tidesong

    Tidesong

    —

    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    Warm sand between our toes, your hand belongs in mine, until our songs are sung; our instruments unstrung. Ryan Stone Written for National Poetry Month 2016 @ The Music In It – Aging.

  • Days

    Days

    —

    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    Sometimes she’s wildfire, burning through the night; some days she’s a winter storm, ice and fury unleashed. Sometimes she’s a shadow, neither fully here or really there; some days she’s untamable, wild as rolling seas. Sometimes I hold her close, as the world starts coming undone; some days we fit together and I feel that…

  • The Weight

    The Weight

    —

    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    One drunken night, he lay on the coach road and she lay beside him. He pictured a truck descending–wobbling around corners, gaining momentum. They spoke about crushes, first kisses. He told her of an older woman who’d stolen a thing he couldn’t replace. He tried to describe the weight of lost things. She listened until…

  • Old Photograph

    Old Photograph

    —

    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    In the photo I keep in my wallet you’re smiling. No hint of ghosts in the glint of your eye. You’re sitting on a riverbank weaving a daisy chain I wore until it crumbled– linking flower to flower with the unblemished certainty that beauty and vows are forever. Ryan Stone

  • My Love

    —

    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    -blazon after Woloch My love with her chocolate river of tresses, Her slow-flowing curls, polished mahogany. My love with her lips of tequila sunrise With her milky-skinned sin, spreading wildfire blush. My love with her hummingbird voice Her windswept dune song, her soul strumming hum My love with her eyes of moonstone and twilight, Her…

  • Irish Fire

    Irish Fire

    —

    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    My grandmother called it Irish fire, said it raged through my father hotter than Beli Mawr’s bum. She was long dead when it finally flared fiercer than he could contain. The embers of his eyes scorched childhood’s last leaves to ash, left them smoldering. Ryan Stone

  • Breaking Point

    Breaking Point

    —

    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    Pa, I see you in your shed– unaware of dusk settling over your garden, painting your pink crabapple blossoms grey. I see you bend, to squint at some small imperfection marring the wooden soldier you’ve spent the whole day carving, hands slow-dancing to a tune no-one else can hear. Later Ma will shake her head,…