Tobey Hiller
small boat
o small boat, she said. small boat.
was it prayer? incantation?
boats must be built near water. if you build them
in the mountains, you must find a river.
if you build one in the desert you must harness cloud.
some boats are made of mud. no float
will come of that. some boats are made of muscle
and their timber will last for years,
until time carves itself toward bone. some boats
are made of wish but spit and promise
can't survive the rapids. all boats
are too small for all the cargo, and it's not long
before the bailing starts. some boats
can recognize the shore, but then, oh then
you'll need a horse.
Bio
Tobey Hiller's publications in poetry & fiction include: --Three poetry collections: Crossings, Certain Weathers, and Aqueduct (Oyez, Oyez, & Clear Mt. Press); a novel, Charlie's Exit (EdgeWork), poetry, short fiction & flash in many magazines and journals, national and international, print and online, and also in 4 anthologies, most recently Fire and Rain: Ecopoetry of California (Scarlet Tanager Books, 2018). --Awards: two magazine firsts for poems; in fiction: "The Seventh Blue," finalist for the 2009 Reynolds Price Short Fiction Award, "Splinter," finalist for the 2016 Los Gatos-Listowel Short Story Contest, and "Blue, Wide and Very Cold," current finalist for a Bosque Magazine award. --Her chapbook Crow Mind will be published next year by Finishing Line Press. She's also at work on a short story collection.