by Esther Sadoff

It is too late in the year to water the flowers.
I let them dry and char under the wheel of light.

I envy the leaves of the Rosy Periwinkle,
still growing as day stills into fresh parchment.

At night, the crickets and locusts are in cahoots,
their song sizzling like a live wire, a spark to light the sky.

I smell wood smoke and damp weed.
A dark chirp, renegade as a storm of leaves.

When the day rises, I reinvent the sun,
dawn of ironweed and stubby brush.

A deer tiptoes across my brow.
They tell me it's the age of mums.

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Esther Sadoff currently lives in Columbus, Ohio, where she teaches English to gifted and talented middle school students. She has a bachelor’s degree from Sarah Lawrence College where she studied literature as well as a Master of Education from The Ohio State University. Her poems have been featured or are forthcoming in Passengers Journal, SWWIM Every Day, Marathon Literary Review, Sunspot Literary Journal, West Trade Review, River Mouth Review, and Penultimate Peanut, as well as other publications.

by Esther Sadoff

Like windows between windows,
solid air encapsulates the space between us.
A faint shadow separates sight from occurrence.
My thoughts overflow into the distant
horizon like Rapunzel lingering in extremity,
weaving last-minute silk into ladders.
Her tears restored vision
to a prince who still felt far away,
as if touching a thing meant you could keep it,
as if the world were made of balconies
spilling onto other balconies,
as if all you had to do was let your hair
down and see who climbed back up.

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Esther Sadoff currently lives in Columbus, Ohio, where she teaches English to gifted and talented middle school students. She has a bachelor’s degree from Sarah Lawrence College where she studied literature as well as a Master of Education from The Ohio State University. Her poems have been featured or are forthcoming in The 2River View, The Bookends Review, River River, SWIMM Every Day, Marathon Literary Review, Sunspot Literary Journal, West Trade Review, and River Mouth Review.

By Esther Sadoff

The leaves rippling
like wide-bellied sails
on a blustery shore,
the hedge thick with birds,
and the black, velvety
crickets chirping in
the cradle of the dark
tell us we are the same
age. We are burglars
arrested on the same night,
hands slipping into
a fortuitous handshake,
cars beaming past
a tumbledown shack
where a frenetic farmer
drives his tractor
upon the lip of dusk.
We are a few sparks
rubbed together in
the universe by giant
palms, poured into
the same cup of each
brief, waking moment,
falling in and out of the same
happenstance with hands
outstretched, and so vastly
outnumbered by the dead
that we might as well
celebrate it on the same day.

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Esther Sadoff currently lives in Columbus, Ohio, where she teaches English to gifted and talented middle school students. She has a bachelor’s degree from Sarah Lawrence College where she studied literature as well as a Master of Education from The Ohio State University. Her poems have been featured or are forthcoming in The 2River View, The Bookends Review, and Tule Review.