AUTUMN MORNING
Winter is sitting not far away
on an old park bench,
its green paint flaking and cracked.
His brown coat is open and he
is peeling a tart apple
he swiped in the market.
His dead father’s pocketknife,
all the old man left to him,
turns the skin from the flesh
in one sharp red ring.
Smell the air and there
the blue edge, oiled and fine,
grazes the tender hair
at the top of your spine.
James Keegan is an author and actor, who, for over a decade, has been a member of the resident acting company at The American Shakespeare Center’s Blackfriars Playhouse. He is an associate professor of English and theater at the University of Delaware, in Georgetown, DE. His poems, essays, and short fiction have appeared in Poet Lore, Southern Poetry Review, The Gettysburg Review, and The Best Small Fictions of 2015. He lives in Milton, Delaware.
The Spy is pleased to reprint Mr. Keegan’s poem from the coming Delmarva Review’s ninth issue. The literary journal is published by the Eastern Shore Writers
Association with additional support from private contributions and a grant from the Talbot County Arts Council with funds from the Maryland State Arts Council. For information, visit: www.delmarvareview.com.
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