escape

we left everything behind as though the house was burning or the fields were black with locusts. an archetypal escape, i wrapped the baby in blankets and fastened him to my chest and we may as well have tiptoed away in the night, but we didn’t have a mule to carry our things we had a hatchback and when we hit 75 miles per hour on the direct route to the mountains with the window cracked just a bit, the whole of the car exhaled. we had gone, we’d be safe, so now whenever someone tells me they’re going through divorce i can’t help it: congratulations just tumbles right out of my mouth i hope they know i only mean, you deserve this, to be untethered to that pain. 

L. Kardon is a poet and parent residing in Philadelphia. Look for L.’s work this season in Wizards in Space Magazine, The Gyroscope Review, and Moontide Press’s upcoming anthology Sh*t Men Say to Me. 

A Song for L.