the tree outside our window yields mysterious flowers that splatter over the footpath.
we collect them to place ex-voto before spring’s altar as if attempting to seduce the summer back.
dog-eared photographs slipped between the pages of books on the shelves won’t save us,
nor stringing paper dolls from bedpost to bedpost;
but for now we are safe from the overwhelming nostalgia that plagues us
(we are hiding, wrapped up in the dusty curtains so tight)

Rebecca Isgrove