The Lost Prologue
Joyce Ritchie
Two flues, alike in function if not form,
on opposite sides of the household serve,
one clears the air, the other keeps us warm
as up through both the smoky vapors curve.
One roars, a blackened fish or fowl obscures,
all conversation lost to nourishment;
the other’s aromatic crackling lures,
it’s quiet warmth near holy sacrament
for our two lovers, lost in reverie
as spectral spirits dance in flick’ring flames.
Blessed in each other, in dreams see clearly
how grace and luck, each familiar’s touch,
frames the arc that bends across a life.
These friends: it’s still a mystery how their story ends.
Joyce Ritchie
Joyce Ritchie grew up among Midwest farm fields and now lives in the coastal Mid-Atlantic; place infuses her poems. A Pushcart and Best of the Net nominee, her poetry publications include Autumn Sky Daily Poetry, Blue Heron Review, Canary, Passager, Persimmon Tree, Sunlight Press, and the poetry anthology The Nature of Our Times, a collaborative initiative of Paloma Press, Poets for Science, United by Nature, and the Kent State Wick Poetry Center.