Fourth

By Dayna Patterson

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We gather together
on the 8th floor
rooftop garden

as twilight gathers
her dusky robes
around her

and we pull jackets
a little closer, wait.
Some plant I can’t name

sweetens
the evening,
softens the darkness

as we hold our children
on our laps
or prop them up

on benches
or the chairs we’ve 
wheeled from their

rooms. Each child
brings their tree
with them

and we watch 
fireworks
through the gaps & 

crannies of tubing,
metal, bags of chemicals
slow dripping

into their hearts.
Bursts of color
in the distance

elicit soft oohs
and ahhs from our
sleepy mouths.

It’s past bedtime,
but we stay
as long as we can manage,

till the pump alarms
begin to beep
or eyes begin to sag,

and we walk or wheel
our drugged kids
indoors

to the calm
of scrubbed rooms
and dim lights

and beds that will
hold them
perhaps one more night

or two
before releasing them
home

like sparks
into the long waiting
night

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Dayna Patterson is the author of O Lady, Speak Again and If Mother Braids a Waterfall, both from Signature Books. She collaborated with Susan Alexander, Luther Allen, Jennifer Bullis, and Bruce Beasley to produce a poetry collection of interwoven poems, A Spiritual Thread. She received the Association for Mormon Letters Poetry Award, and two of her poems appear in Best Spiritual Literature, 2023. See daynapatterson.com.

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• 02/12 / Poetry Reading and Conversation with visiting poet-in-residence Allison Blevins & local poets Carolina Hospital, Nicole Hospital-Medina, and Holly Iglesias / The BBar at The Betsy-South Beach, Miami Beach, FL / Live and Live-Streamed on Instagram Live/Facebook Live at @swwimmiami / 7-8:30 pm EST / Free

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