Sunset in the Autumn Forest

by Amy Soricelli
 
 
Jenny's father has a wall of paint-by-number art 
he created during his five summers at camp Wallaby 
in the Catskills. Most of it is brown angry-orange suns 
bleeding slightly over a mountain then over the floral couch. 
He doesn't say anything about them, but you can't turn away
if you're looking for scissors in the top desk drawer 
or have wandered in after a lazy afternoon in a book. 
There is one painting of a loopy road where the trees are fat 
versions of themselves, but on the other side they look like 
they're barely trying. No one can be sure why the road is so curvy, 
or if that's a dog running wild or just a smudge of paint. 
The painting by the window is a tent in the woods.  
There seems to be a campfire turning into dust, but her father 
sells insurance now so no one wants to ask.


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"Sunset in the Autumn Forest" was first published in Glimpse, 11/2021.

Amy Soricelli has been published in numerous publications and anthologies including Remington Review, The Westchester Review, Deadbeats, Long Island Quarterly, Literati Magazine, The Muddy River Poetry Review, Pure Slush, Cider Press Review, Glimpse Poetry Magazine, and many others. That Plane is not a Star, 4/2024, Dancing Girl Press; Carmen has No Umbrella but Went for Cigarettes Anyway, Dancing Girl Press 9/2021; Sail Me Away, Dancing Girl Press, 10/2019. Nominations: Pushcart Prize, 2021, Best of the Net 2020, 2013. Nominated by Billy Collins for Aspen Words Emerging Writer's Fellowship/2019, Grace C. Croff Poetry Award, Herbert H Lehman College, 1975.