tent cluster under bare trees by the freeway
tent hamlet wreathed by an entrance ramp
gulls’ silhouettes hover-swarm
the dumpsters on a market’s back lot
newsprint and brown paper bags layered
into a damp bed by the trail
frost like a holiday’s glitter still
on the skins of cars
and I’m warm
in the wool of my coat
and already
the purple crocuses
the purple hellebore
a mama raccoon leads three plump young
across the street
I am alright
in my scarf and hat
this isn’t Syria
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Jed Myers is author of Watching the Perseids (Sacramento Poetry Center), The Marriage of Space and Time (MoonPath Press), and four chapbooks. Recent poems appear in Rattle, Poetry Northwest, The American Journal of Poetry, Tinderbox Poetry Journal, Ruminate, and elsewhere. He edits poetry for Bracken.
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