That Dark Battle

That Dark Battle

Alyssa Stadtlander

and then he said, one day
we will have to watch
each other die, right after
I’d been thinking about my grandmother’s
paper thin skin and last night’s return
to the hospital to stop
the bleeding—warning signs
in red, tags that read
inheritance. There is no escaping
that dark battle, only moving
towards the looming night, only allowing
our bodies—those soft edged weapons—
to grow wiser and stronger with age.

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Alyssa Stadtlander
Writer & Teacher

Alyssa is a writer, theater artist, musician and teacher based in Boise, Idaho. Her work can be found in Mudfish Magazine (upcoming), The Poet’s Corner with The Page Gallery, and in the anthologies Advent: Having Wings, Poems for the Great Vigil of Easter, and Writers in the Attic: Rupture. For more of her work, visit www.alyssastadtlander.com.

Photography by Charles Deluvio