Seasonal Affective Disorder by Ryan Napier

Seasonal Affective Disorder

Ryan Napier

Jacob van Ruisdael, Cuyp, and other Dutch
And Flemish landscape painters used the gray
Low-Country skies and stony seas to state
Their theme. They would have loved Connecticut,
Where seaside yankees strain to hear the cough
(However slight) of waves, and only low
Dividers block that greater sea—the road.
The cars may crash; the waves do not. At left,
Four people wearing sweatshirts stare. They call
This place "the shore:" they know a thing less sand
Than soil is not a "beach." Florida haunts
New England, calls to New Haven with palms
And postcard beauty—both a hope and gulf
Within the slushy, leafless Northern self.

Ryan Napier was born in Plant City, Florida. He holds degrees in literature from Stetson University and Yale Divinity School. His most recent story, "Gnashing of Teeth," appears in The South Florida Arts Journal, and another story is forthcoming in The Rappahannock Review. He lives in Moscow.

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