A Poem from your Editor, April Salzano

Weeping Willow

I am finally afraid to die, though I know
that was not my husband’s intention
when he planted a willow tree at the edge
of the driveway. I know this
is where I will sit in twenty years
when the trunk has finally grown tall
enough so the embrace of branches forms
the canopy where I will wait for my grandchildren
to arrive on a day not unlike today,
autumn a mere threat against September sun.
They will say, there is grandma under her tree.
I know the roots my tree is forming
will ensure that it outlives me, them,
their own children, just as I know my roots
extend only just beneath the surface.

 

 

 

April Salzano teaches college writing in Pennsylvania where she lives with her husband and two sons. She recently finished her first collection of poetry, for which she is seeking a publisher and is working on a memoir on raising a child with autism. Her work has appeared in journals such as Poetry Salzburg, Convergence, Ascent Aspirations, The Camel Saloon, Centrifugal Eye, Deadsnakes, Montucky Review, Visceral Uterus, Salome, Poetry Quarterly, Writing Tomorrow and Rattle. The author also serves as co-editor at Kind of a Hurricane Press.