Some mornings I want

to wake up with nothing more than

my imagination intact

and a cup of green tea as deep

as a hole dug in summer, perfectly

steeped and grassy.

It turns out this life is not our own.

Voices frozen, beg.

The cats must be fed.

I avoid the mirror all winter. I promise

I’ll be so much younger next week.

The snow in my hair never melts.

Mark Robinson earned his MFA from Lindenwood University and studied English Literature at the University of Iowa. His poems have appeared in Faultline Journal, River! River!, Exterminating Angel Press, Stillwater Review, Dunes Review, Naugatuck River Review, Levee Magazine and Bending Genres, among others. He was a semi-finalist for Crab Creek Review 2020 poetry contest, and his chapbook Just Last Days was published in January 2020. Mark currently lives in West Des Moines, IA. Twitter: @MarkRobPoet