Three poems by Gail Wawrzyniak

An Insomniac’s Prayer

• I should have listened
• when they said it was unlucky

• to point at the moon and
• count the stars.

• But while at the mountain,
• I was foolish.

• Too close, I invaded
• their celestial space.

• My luck turned and now
• I’ve been awake for months.

• I walk that mountain,
• crazed, barely able to talk.

• Each night I plead, but the man
• in the moon turns away.

• Every star I see
• now is a new prayer.

• That one for clarity,
• that one for strength,

• that one for wisdom,
• that one for sleep.

• Forgive me.
• I didn’t mean to point.

With Abandon

• She rushed the dune
• while we struggled

• using the light
• of a cell phone

• to make our way,
• gingerly, up and over

• Topsail’s well worn
• beach stairs.

• On the dune’s ocean side,
• we smiled at footprints,

• wide and wild,
• where she had run

• to the ocean’s
• moonlit spray.

St. Jean de Belleville Wedding Music

• Ancient church bells
• sweeten French alpine air,
• while cows, with their signature chimes,
• graze in the high pasture.
• Yes, joy.

Gail Wawrzyniak writes fiction, poetry, plays, short stories, and essays.  Her writing has appeared in publications such as Amsterdam Quarterly, Halfway Down the Stairs, Yellow Medicine Review, Haunted Water Press, Sentinel Literary Quarterly, and the anthology, Stories Migrating Home.  She lives in Raleigh, NC, and is online at gailwawrzyniak.com.