A Palliative Approach to Twilight
by Shana Ross
If the sun is going to keep on
rising and setting like everything is normal
OK, that’s OK, we all
cope in our own way, you know?
I twist for antacid tabs in the middle of
the night, to chew to grind to swallow,
whatever it takes to quiet the sour burning.
It leaks out when I lie flat. I am tender
to the touch. I am corroding my own existence.
My dreams are so small: meaning I am in them.
I ask two things of myself: say nothing in a poem
that I could not say to a face. Say anything,
as long as I know why I need it to be heard.
I get hung up on that last part, the way the wind
blows the trash bins—flips open the top,
lays them out with a bang, pushes them
down the ice of the sidewalk,
farther than I ever expected.
My efforts are so practical: accept this too
will end. I’d like to say do no harm, but I can’t
imagine being that slight in the world.
Shana Ross is a recent transplant to Edmonton, Alberta, and Treaty 6 Territory. Qui transtulit sustinet. Her work has recently appeared in Great Weather for MEDIA, Ninth Letter, Quarter After Eight, Literary Review of Canada, and more. She prefers long walks in the woods to social media and budgets her time accordingly.