The Cage Door
\n(for Stephanie Hallgren 5\/21\/11)<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Know this: I know ballyhoo & people famous with a small \u201cf\u201d with their approval. But it is a lucky sleep indeed On the day the world is scheduled to end, <\/p>\n Michael G. Hickey<\/a>\u00a0is a tenured creative writing professor at South Seattle Community College. In addition to being an award-winning teacher, labor leader, and political activist, he has volunteered as a creative writing instructor for children at bereavement camps, prisoners at the Monroe Correctional Complex, and juveniles\u00a0at King County Youth Detention. In 2009, Hickey was inaugurated as Seattle’s eighth “Poet Populist”. <\/a>His community project was entitled “Seattle Writes” <\/a>in which residents of Seattle and King County were\u00a0encouraged to submit a poem on the theme of “Neighbors.”\u00a0<\/a>There\u00a0are over 200 poems on the site to date including submissions from the\u00a0kindergarten class of the New Discovery School as well as\u00a0some of the finest poets in the region including\u00a0Elizabeth Austen, Martha Clarkson, and Tatyana Mishel.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Cage Door (for Stephanie Hallgren 5\/21\/11) Know this: for every phony from Catcher in the Rye revered by applauding saguaros, player pianos, & accolades standing in line, there is an antidote in a long white dress with strawberry … Continue reading
\nfor every phony from Catcher in the Rye<\/em>
\nrevered by applauding saguaros, player pianos,
\n& accolades standing in line,
\nthere is an antidote in a long white dress with strawberry hair.<\/p>\n
\nwhose peanut is more like a shell
\nor the two rodent parts per million
\nallowed in canned chili. I\u2019m ashamed to admit
\nI sometimes beg them to tattoo my scars<\/p>\n
\nto dream of you, or at least the idea of you:
\nthe leap second to correct atomic clocks,
\nblue mountains in love,
\nthe whisper of hands praying in supplication.<\/p>\n
\nthe only revelation I see is a river running with hope.
\nBecause haven\u2019t you heard?
\nThe eye of the storm is myopic.
\nThe door of my cage has been lifted.<\/p>\n