….
Blue Flannel
…..
A fragment of a blue flannel shirt,
wind-frayed and snagged, hangs
in the branches of a red maple.
It’s not mine—the shirt. But I pass
it each day on my walk.
So I claim it as a mental possession,
like a tick mark on a list of things
that tracks where I am in my day.
……
I need these things,
these talismans.
Otherwise my days
spin without catching
like a broken roulette wheel:
no risk, but also no purpose.
…..
……
This poem is from the chapbook Free-Fall, and is available at https://www.finishinglinepress.com/product/free-fall-by-dana-yost/
……
Free-Fall is a tightly packed, often-intense chapbook with poems about mental health, today’s politics and culture and about family — with the three sometimes interwoven. And yet there are moments when it finds beauty and wonder in the world. It’s all done with rock-solid images and language that poet Susan McLean says ‘’find a solidity as real as the stone that slips soundlessly into the river.’’
Dana Yost was an award-winning daily newspaper journalist for 29 years. He is a three-time Pushcart Prize nominee. Since 2008, he has published eight books.
Dana Yost
The Paddock Review 