Hunting rock pool shells
At sunrise, the tide tugging
My child’s toes too soon
Ryan Stone
Undertow
Trust
Soft snores beside me
A wheaten curl of warm sleep
Outside the wind howls
Ryan Stone
Anadromous
She swims up Main Street
A pink flash against the flow
Seeking calm waters
Ryan Stone
Ashtray Girl
A tiger’s red eye blinking—
she sucked each joint
to ash, slid her hands
past no return,
snatched
my hard-earned cash.
She surfed a wave of whiskey
past the breakers
each new dawn,
claimed every song
worth singing
remained as yet unsung.
I met her and grew old
with her, with only
one regret—
our spark flared
bright, but faded fast;
a burnt-out cigarette.
Ryan Stone
In Passing
At your funeral
Wisterias and silence
Even the wind dies
Ryan Stone
Kintsugi
a crafter’s love hides
inside the vase, until cracks
let sunlight shine in
You’re Missing
Spring cleaning windows
a paw print from last summer
fractures the sunlight
– Ryan Stone
How quickly the years slip past. Gone but never forgotten, old mate.
The Darkest Night
The mind has many defences, she wrote
in her award-winning essay. Glowing,
she stood in front of her school;
movie tickets her prize.
Painted in shades between girl and woman
she kissed me goodbye with bright red lips
and joined her friends in line.
The mind has many defences, she wrote.
Maybe that’s why, in police reports,
many claimed they’d heard fireworks.
Odd in a cinema; the alternative
too grim to believe.
– Ryan Stone
First published in Poppy Road Review, February 2016
days of stone 