Angel Unawares

Angel Unawares

Emma Galloway Stephens

The woman is unlovely.
She pushes a stroller
full of everything but a baby.
Her language is thick syrup
stuck in the tree of her throat.
She wears a jumble of clothing,
a coat of many colors.
She has money enough for soup
at this underground café—
its mismatched couches laden
with bristling adolescents,
puffer vests and pleats.
She does not see them.
She sits across from a motley friend,
lowering the soup before him,
muttering incantations heard of old
in halls of golden kings,
folding her hands before her
like crooked wings.

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Emma Galloway Stephens
Poet & Educator

Emma's work has appeared in Catfish Stew, The Windhover, The Nature of Things, and The Fallow House. She is an assistant professor of English and creative writing at a Christian liberal arts university in South Carolina. 

 Photography by Matheus Viana