Poetry Pause is the League of Canadian Poets’ daily poetry dispatch. Read “Milk Pail Ballad” by Emily Bulicz-Arnelien.

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Milk Pail Ballad

By Emily Bulicz-Arnelien

As the storm rolls in, I puddle in the basement

while you practice piano against the thunderclaps

And soon, the barn cats scatter under the caragana

At sunset, we walk the path of the tornado,

barefoot, dress for bed in our summer nightgowns

There is no sleep without these raindrops, this breeze

scented with honeysuckles, and in the morning

we paint the windowsills yellow, as planned

For lunch we eat chocolate cake,

drink milk from Heidi, the Holstein

Ranger is rolling in the mud, through wolf willow

in the pasture. And we, running like coyotes

to the canola horizon

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Copyright © Emily Bulicz-Arnelien

Emily Bulicz-Arnelien is an emerging writer based in southern Ontario and raised on the rural prairies of Saskatchewan. She is an MFA in Fiction candidate through the University of King’s College—graduating Spring 2025—from where she holds a BA in Creative Writing & English. Her work, including fiction and poetry, has appeared in Contemporary Verse 2, Tidewise Illustrated Quarterly, Venus Hour, and en*gendered.

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