Power Lines

I fear the cold,
walls will fall away.
Someone will pull the pins
and a map of tsunamis will cover us.
The power lines take our power.
I fear my blood
won’t come.
Somebody will take my body
and make me a house
for someone else to haunt.
I fear saying the word
no. Because
what do I know?
I sit on the bus
and strangers watch me
think about coffee
while I look out the window
watching winter fall
apart
like wet tissue paper
in the crumbling hands
of sky.

Author of the article

Tresha Faye Haefner’s poetry appears, or is forthcoming in several journals and magazines, most notably Blood Lotus, Blue Mesa Review, The Cincinnati Review, Five South, Hunger Mountain, Mid-America Review, Pirene’s Fountain, Poet Lore, Prairie Schooner, Radar, Rattle, TinderBox, and Up the Staircase Quarterly. Her work has garnered several accolades, including the 2011 Robert and Adele Schiff Poetry Prize, and a 2012, 2020, and 2021 nomination for a Pushcart. Her first manuscript, Pleasures of the Bear was a finalist for prizes from both Moon City Press and Glass Lyre Press. It is forthcoming from Pine Row Press in 2023.