Meg Freer
Cynical Breaths
I want to brush the raindrops off your lip,
but there are degrees of “used to”--
and feelings, like clouds, simply exist.
Bodies are just bodies, and love
poems only words to read over
and over, tomorrow and tomorrow,
tearing and repairing the sheer fabric
of feelings, my vanity’s consonant foe.
Vanity is a dangerous state of being.
And lions—in their vainglory
at the top of the game--
even lions go hungry.
Meg Freer grew up in Montana under the influence of Pacific Northwest poets Stafford and Hugo, who were occasional guests in her family’s home, but she has only written her own poetry since 2015. She teaches piano in Ontario and enjoys running and photography. Her photos and poems have won awards in North America and overseas and have been published in chapbooks, anthologies and journals including Free Lit Magazine, Rat’s Ass Review, Mothers Always Write and NatureWriting. In 2017 she won a fellowship and attended the Summer Literary Seminars in Tbilisi, Republic of Georgia.
Cynical Breaths
I want to brush the raindrops off your lip,
but there are degrees of “used to”--
and feelings, like clouds, simply exist.
Bodies are just bodies, and love
poems only words to read over
and over, tomorrow and tomorrow,
tearing and repairing the sheer fabric
of feelings, my vanity’s consonant foe.
Vanity is a dangerous state of being.
And lions—in their vainglory
at the top of the game--
even lions go hungry.
Meg Freer grew up in Montana under the influence of Pacific Northwest poets Stafford and Hugo, who were occasional guests in her family’s home, but she has only written her own poetry since 2015. She teaches piano in Ontario and enjoys running and photography. Her photos and poems have won awards in North America and overseas and have been published in chapbooks, anthologies and journals including Free Lit Magazine, Rat’s Ass Review, Mothers Always Write and NatureWriting. In 2017 she won a fellowship and attended the Summer Literary Seminars in Tbilisi, Republic of Georgia.