By John Pring

Early evening and snow falls silent  
as grief. I had been learning to leave  
ajar the door of the aviary, the one  
shadowing the small gardens 
of my chest. When you turned up,  
freezing and exhausted, you had brushes 
tucked under your arm. It isn’t happening 
you said, I don’t know what I’m doing.  
By morning I have cleaned your squirrel 
hair, licked clean the maple  
and the alder. I want to ask if you love  
me the way you used to, but you are  
already leaving. It has to happen in the paint,  
you said, or it doesn’t happen at all.  

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John Pring is a poet and author based in the UK. He has poems published or upcoming in Cordite Poetry Review, Epiphany Literary Journal, Poetry Online, The Comstock Review, South Florida Poetry Journal, and others.