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Now, is my favorite month
by steven baliko
Carved letters have yawned since youth,
leaving gorged butterflies
and meandering, lazy
rivers to be deciphered.
And I try to make new
memories where so many
crowd this sepia haze
but every branch is a trigger
for dozens of days lost
in imaginations richly
innocent and undistracted.
Dismounting the past catches
me cold in November
and I find my fingers stroking,
rubbing rough oak bark
like a lamp housing Hope-
touched 'til June dances on my lips,
smiling.