FLIGHT

                    by Amanda Hope

Have you noticed that hope has a kind of violence?
The way our aspirations chew up birds,

The way the birds jam the machinery of them.
I want to claim everything in my fury: 

Each building and car now a charm for my bracelet,
As though seen toy-sized from the sky. And you, 

I can’t quite get my arms around you, 
Always wandering the terminal. Loosened from this world,

A balloon’s string slipping from a child’s wrist.
You refuse all comfort that would keep you here. I’d offer

Anything: brindle greyhounds, loaves of warm bread,
My hand, full of feathers. You go through them like cloud.







​

​Amanda Hope lives in eastern Massachusetts with her cats. A graduate of Colgate University and Simmons College, she works as a librarian. Her poems have recently appeared in publications including Impossible Archetype, TIMBER, honey & lime, and Barrow Street. Her chapbook, The Museum of Resentments, is forthcoming in 2020 from Paper Nautilus. She enjoys riding the subway, playing in brass bands, and wearing magnificent boots. You can find her on Twitter @AmandaHopePoet.