Gratitude by Riley Richards

His chainsaw is already revving

as he leans a folded a-frame ladder

against the trunk

of an oversized pear tree

and mounts—one foot

on the ladder’s top cap,

the other in the tree’s fork,

his cuts are oar strokes

in still water. My grandfather,

pushing 80, pauses only to hear

the thud when a branch falls,

and let me in my sneakers

and borrowed gloves—

one size too large—

drag the branches away

over the frosted ground.

The bones of his arms are connected

by metal plates and screws,

and when the work is done, I follow

his slow tread

back to the cabin up the hill,

his body bent, the fog

we exhale, the layers we shed,

unknown to age or time.

My shoulders square,

for him.

Riley Richards taught Creative Writing and Political Writing at Uzhhorod National University in Uzhhorod, Ukraine, and is currently a PhD student at Florida State University, where he directs the Southeast Review’s Incarcerated Writers Program. Riley’s work can be found in the Wigleaf Top 50, Fugue, The Journal, After Happy Hour Review, Barrelhouse, and elsewhere.