Mostly Cloudy, Little Chance of Sun

The light outside’s gone white

like it used to in Syracuse

even on those rare winter mornings

when I’d wake to clear blue skies

sun splashed across the snow

I’d step out of class later

to a sky pale and tired

the sun snuffed out

I remember the effort it took

week after week junior year

to force myself back into the tiny study

on the fifth floor of the Hall of Languages

where the university’s Famous Poet

puffed continuously on his pipe

the air in the room the same color

as the sky outside only thicker

and I wonder if I hadn’t been so hungry

hanging on by such a frayed thread

so crazy in love with the sound of words

the way they tasted on my tongue

echoed in my ear, felt in my fingertips

if I would have walked away from the misogyny

in that room and left poetry behind

as if it had been the betrayer

Joanne Holdridge lives in Devens, MA and has recently published poems in Atlanta Review, Illuminations, Poem, and Willow Review. She has appeared in previous issues of Green Hills Literary Lantern and been nominated four times for a Pushcart Prize. As often as she can, she spends winters skiing in northern New Hampshire. Before she was able to devote her winters to skiing, she taught poetry and literature classes to English Language Learners at Bunker Hill Community College for three decades.