HONORABLE MENTION FOR POETRY: HOLD THAT THOUGHT BY CLAUDINE NASH

                                             HOLD THAT THOUGHT
                                                                          BY CLAUDINE NASH

Let’s hold these thoughts
far from our hearts, the timeworn
ones that make us sink
in doubt or draw us down
when we pull forward. Let’s
roll them between our
fingers and feel their thin
cloth catch on our winter
skin.  We’ll crumple them,
lift them up to the window panes,
watch the cold morning pour
through the rips in their
flimsy fabric.
 
I want to lose them at the
beach. We can slip them into
the sea as the tide sets out,
drop them into a deep hole
and watch the sand claim
the shifting space where they
sit. I’m done with these
gnawing whispers. Let’s be
old-school gangsters and
make some silence. I’ll get
the concrete forms, you
toss them from the pier when
the fog rushes the night.
  
(Previously appeared in The Camel Saloon)