by G. Wesley Houp
Fall Morning
The school bus winds down
Laura Thompson Trail
plucking up the forest children
and trundling them off
to school in town
like a sack of acorns.
Sherry watches her
granddaughter lumber
up the narrow steps
beneath a bedazzled
backpack. I wave.
Sherry waves back,
a cup of coffee in her hand.
Two guineas cross the road.
There is no hurry in the
quiet despair of guineas.
G. Wesley Houp’s first book, Strung Out Along the Endless Branch, won the inaugural James Baker Hall Book Award, and will be published May 2025 by Accents Publishing. His poems have appeared in many journals, including Black Warrior Review, Chattahoochee Review, Kentucky Poetry Review, and Limestone, among others.