A poem by Darren Demaree

The fear comes

in not knowing

exactly why

the adults are crying

in the air conditioning

& not knowing why

our bodies curl

from supine to fetal

in the re-positioning

on the couch.

That is the question

in the look

I get from my kids.

Belle can read

the screen

& she knows

how long it takes

her to count

to the height

of the numbers she sees.

Nightly, with the news

she tries to translate

the pictures, the words,

those numbers

& she doesn’t have

the language for that.

She’s six. She knows

what it means though,

when everyone is crying

at the same time.

Darren C. Demaree is the author of five poetry collections, most recently “The Nineteen Steps Between Us” (2016, After the Pause Press).  He is the Managing Editor of the Best of the Net Anthology and Ovenbird Poetry.  He is currently living in Columbus, Ohio with his wife and children.