The Second Poetry Contest Winner –
SUMMER 2024
is Felicia de Chabris
of Eldred, New York – USA
“What if”
What if you let all the secrets you were
keeping leave your mind, like a caged
bird, ready to fly, freeing you, freeing her,
leaving you behind, instead of staying
in the cramped confines where you kept
her all this time
What if, the stranger standing next to you,
at rush hour, on the C train, randomly,
hummed your favorite song
and you fell a little bit in love from the
Port Authority to Canal Street
What if it were too late…and you
could no longer ask your mother,
with dementia, all the things
you wish you had; preoccupied as once
you were. And, then she died…with
everything she had to hide.
What if the tree you’ve touched every day
as you’ve walked by, for years and loved,
because it’s survived so much destruction,
were to hug you back in recognition
What if the diagnosis declared you were unfit
to be a flower. But your friend and confidant
said you could be a tree instead
and live there in their garden
What if we walked so long, holding hands
and laughing in the rain that we washed away,
and were never found or lost again
# # #
By Felicia de Chabris
