Poetry By Laura Tate

Eflon CC




Long Night Moon                

on the morning of the Cold Moon, 
the orange cat paws at the bedroom door,
scatters papers from my small white desk 
so my bare feet step on words 
and the spaces in between. Maybe

some words are about my father, how he strolls 
into dreams and lingers, like memories 
of being three, the way he taught me to look 
for stones and toss them into a cardboard box, 
each stone worth a penny.

A week ago, the daughter of my daughter 
stood facing the night sky, said 
don’t close that door -
I want to see the moon and I think 
it was the first time 
she knew the moon is real.  Tell me 

about Moon of Popping Trees,
the way frozen limbs sing a sad winter song
like the keening of old women. I see 
my grandmothers and all they lost,
nothing but a penny and a stone
in their pockets, 
but still they waited -
they waited for the Wolf Moon.

Open the door.  
Look there, beyond the trees.  

It rises.

​


Laura Tate’s poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Ink in Thirds, One Art Poetry Journal, Thimble Literary Journal, A Curious Moon, and The Remington Review, among others.  Her poem, “Home Is Not a Place,” appeared in Anti-Heroin Chic in 2022.  A poetry reader for Fahmidan Journal, she is a grandmother and retired school teacher who is in the process of relocating from the Washington, D.C. area to southern California where she hopes to see more of the moon.