Before things got difficult for my family,
I complained one Christmas morning
when I didn’t get the toy I wanted.
My mother had actually bought it for me,
but she hid it in the closet
to see how I’d react.
Later, when there were no toys,
when there wasn’t even a closet,
when my mother had died,
the snow on the ground outside
was enough.
Joshua Lew McDermott is a 23 year old poet from Idaho. He sometimes lives in Logan, Utah, where he organizes readings and independently publishes his friends’ work. He has two cats, reads a lot of anarchistic books, and likes to go hiking. “