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</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--></head><body lang=EN-US link="#0563C1" vlink="#954F72" style='word-wrap:break-word'><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal>In the Meantime<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Max Garland<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><a href="https://poets.org/poem/meantime?mc_cid=830cbe711a&mc_eid=db914003ad">https://poets.org/poem/meantime?mc_cid=830cbe711a&mc_eid=db914003ad</a><o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>The river rose wildly every seventh spring<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>or so, and down the hatch went the town,<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>just a floating hat box or two, a cradle,<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>a cellar door like an ark to float us back<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>into the story of how we drown but never<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>for good, or long. How the ornate numbers <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>of the bank clock filled with flood, how <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>we scraped minute by minute the mud <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>from the hours and days until the gears<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>of time started to catch and count again.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Calamity is how the story goes, how<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>we built the books of the Bible. Not <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>the one for church, but the one the gods<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>of weather inscribed into our shoulder<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>blades and jawbones to grant them grit<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>enough to work the dumb flour of day<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>into bread and breath again. The world<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>has a habit of ending, every grandmother <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>and father knew well enough never to say,<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>so deeply was it stained into the brick <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>and mind. We live in the meantime<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>is how I remember the length of twilight <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>and late summer cicadas grinding the air<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>into what seemed like unholy racket to us, <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>but for them was the world’s only music.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Copyright © 2021 by Max Garland. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on November 11, 2021, by the Academy of American Poets.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'>Ann M. Chiappetta, M.S.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'>Making Meaningful ConnectionsThrough Media <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>914.393.6605 USA<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><a href="mailto:Anniecms64@gmail.com">Anniecms64@gmail.com</a><o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>All things Annie: <a href="http://www.annchiappetta.com">www.annchiappetta.com</a> <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div></body></html>