Poetry By Beth Kanell

Judith Jackson CC




How to Pray
 
The first day of high school, lost twice and late once,
you had to believe you’d get used to it. When they told you
by graduation you would understand integrals and essays
 
and how someone could think another person’s tongue
felt okay after all, during long kisses—you said “not me”
and you were right. Because in senior year you started drinking,
 
turned into someone else. A few years later, some mornings
you held a baby, yours or your sister’s, and saw G-d in those
unblinking eyes. Longed to be able to repair for a child
 
all the wounds and angers—protect, prevent, cuddle--
though your wallet was worn out as your exhausted body,
breath ragged, tears escaping. You could not recall your dreams
 
when fatigue wiped them clean, even as morning dragged
you forward, rising to tackle it all again, sometimes embittered
sometimes proud, one day sober. You couldn’t see it then
 
but hard times unspooled like silver threads behind you, a web
of connection and surprises. One day you’ll find a lump
(or the doctor, or a machine, will see it first) and gasp,
 
terror rough as a battered pinecone in the throat. Count
sessions of radiation, doses of poisons metered into you with care
admit pain and the certainty that all of us die, even you
 
though a taste of immortality stings your lips like salt
after a hard day’s running. Months later, kneaded and molded,
you will treasure the self you’ve dragged back from dark waters,
 
wrung out; in sunshine, drying. Whisper “Wow.” Then “thanks.”
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Beth Kanell lives in northeastern Vermont among rivers, rocks, and writers. Her poems seek comfortable seats in small well-lit places, including The Comstock Review, Indianapolis Review, Gyroscope Review, The Post-Grad Journal, Persimmon Tree, Northwind Treasury, RockPaperPoem, and Rise Up Review. Explore her collection Thresholds (Kelsay Books).
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