Chest Without a Name

I keep my verse in a chest of drawers each one so very different Some words for summer, some for winter and some then most intemperate I keep the best one’s locked away for those times when you’re around To dress each phrase in sunlit fire with silks and linens found I fold each poem nice and neat stacked end to end they lay To sit and wait, my breath exhaled until their chosen day There’s one drawer open every night in case my dreams conspire The thickest warmest woolen clads to wrap the image dire One day I’ll will this chest of drawers to my first born oldest son And hope he wears each line as his and lets the meanings run And then to his son, he’ll pass on when fate calls out his name The drawers more full than when I left —this chest without a name (Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2018)