Airport Pickup
When you texted
you’d missed your flight
from Vegas to my arms
I went to the only place I could
the library
who turns no one away
and checked out
a stack of friends new and old
to hold my hands
fill my cupboards my freezer
mostly
to strap into the other seat
while I speed
the Pacific Coast Highway
just Mary Oliver
Saeed Jones
Cisneros
with her turquoise bracelets
raised left eyebrow
(nothing like you)
and me:
sunlit and satisfied.
Candice Kelsey’s work has appeared in such journals as Poet Lore, The Cortland Review, and North Dakota Quarterly. She published a successful trade paperback with Da Capo Press, was a finalist for Poetry Quarterly’s Rebecca Lard Award, and recently was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. An educator of 20 years’ standing with her MA in literature from LMU, she lives in Los Angeles with her husband and three children.