“The Son of Man,” oil on canvas, by Christian Skredsvig, 1891.

by Pam Vap

1. a white lily
with sails of petals
above the pink blush on the weak stem

2. the small wooden trunk lugged
out just this morning

3. the dusty, square box of a farmhouse
leaning precariously and looking
out of place on 160 acres

4. an uncaring, wide horizon
fading to powdery blue
and stretching to who knows where

5. an occasional meadowlark’s whistle breaking
into the July drone of insects

6. the German couple
without their Schätzchen

7. the young woman’s empty hand
lying like a stone on

8. the trunk lid covering

9. the baby

Pam Vap is a high school English teacher in Phoenix, Arizona. For her MFA, she received an Outstanding Thesis Award from University of Nebraska for her book nightwriting. She was a first place winner in the Nebraska Writer’s Guild Poetry contest, a first place Goodreads poetry winner, and a finalist in the Prime Number Magazine Award for Poetry. She has recently published in Poetry East, The RavensPerch, Pudding Magazine, Poetry From the Plains, DASH Literary Journal, and elsewhere.