Letter from the Porch

by Anastasia Vassos


This morning’s mist coats
the air past the stairs, obscuring
the birch across the street, its outline
smudged against almost-gray —
say, unwashed silk & a chickadee’s
saffron streak rushes to rip
into the birch’s canopy. 
Storm clouds to the west.
Suddenly the wind picks them up
the sky a furious rush
a cataract in the drenched
eye of the world & all self-pity
washed clean in the deluge.
The chickadee lands
on the handrail
leading up to the porch.
A message, I think.
Our shared presence
that swells after the storm
in the sun’s radiant lip.

Today’s the day
you died five years ago—
I still feel the weight
of your absence, proportioned
to—what? Maybe to the idea
I can’t fix what we broke
when you were alive.
The wind a cool hand
a kind of augury
nudging my shoulder.
See, this street could be an ocean
how it shimmers after rain
& absorbs it. Sometimes grief
is my favorite color.
I wish you could have seen
the birch, the chickadee.


* * * * *

Anastasia Vassos is the author of Nostos (Kelsay Books, 2023) and Nike Adjusting Her Sandal (Nixes Mate, 2021). Her poems have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net, and Best New Poets. Find her work in RHINO, Whale Road Review, Thrush, Lily Poetry Review, Comstock Review, Off the Grid, and elsewhere. She is a reader for Lily Poetry Review, speaks three languages, and lives in Boston.