days of stone

Tag: youth

  • Infinite

    —

    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

  • Choke Town

    —

    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    The butcher’s sign still swings,though the shop’s been guttedsince Gaz ran a hose from the tailpipeand left the lights on. The school gate’s rusted open.Wind sifts chalk dustthrough cracked windowswhere names once lined the rolllike prayers in hell. Down at the silo,kids mainline in the shadowof grain that never came.One girl carved a starinto her…

  • First Smoke

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    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    I lit it behind the shedwith a match I struck on the tin—my thumb raw from trying. The cigarette trembledbetween fingers that still knewLego and scraped knees. I didn’t cough.Didn’t blink.Just held the burn inlike I was keeping a secretonly smoke could understand. The dog watched,head tilted,like he knew I’d crossedinto something I couldn’t uncross.…

  • The Stack

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    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    Miss Carr was the strict one—hair wired tight,skirts to the shin,a voice of rulesand overdue fines. The library breathed her name.Quiet, please.Return on time.Hands to yourself. I once saw her shush the deputy principal,and he apologised. We said she slept in the archives,alphabetised her dreams,quietened ghosts for sport. She didn’t see me—tucked in Fiction,in the…

  • Red Wagon

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    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    I pulled my dog through summers,tongue lolling in the heat,ears twitching at beesand things only he could hear. The wagon rattled like laughterover cracked footpaths,and I—captain of that small red ship—knew no world beyondthe corner storeand the shade beneath our tree. It was enough. Now I carry more—keys, deadlines, debt,the ache of wantingwhat I used…

  • you left before the bell

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    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.…

  • Pulling Back the Sheet

    Pulling Back the Sheet

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    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    It started as a scribble in my yearbook and ended with an apology, of sorts: I wish I’d been more, held your hand when it mattered and even when it didn’t. Ink lasts longer than schoolyard dreams, wilted before their bloom. Notes we wrote lend breath to ghosts, long after pens fall still. In this…

  • Tidesong

    Tidesong

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    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.

  • The Weight

    The Weight

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    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…

  • I’ll not tread lightly

    I’ll not tread lightly

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    by

    Ryan Stone
    in

    Remember school days and how we would play like there was no tomorrow? Now the castles we made are the price we must pay or flounder in oceans of sorrow. Roaming wild and free, building houses in trees as worlds waltzed to discordant tunes– like a zephyr through grass, gilded summer days passed, left us…