Live Encounters Poetry & Writing Volume Two Nov-Dec 2026.
Harvest Moon, poems by Serena Agusto-Cox.
Harvest Moon
Cool white light illuminates the garden
abundant with late ripening vegetables.
As a child, I believed the moon summoned beasts
and after sunset, farmers in the field were devoured.
Now, I see lasting moonlight —
not as a cry for wakefulness —
I stay and marvel at the brightest night.
Writer’s retreat with a freight train
Horn blares at the crossing of lines
before the next stanza begins.
Rumble of its wheelsets on tracks,
sounds of words in each line,
a rhythm unbroken and held by the bogie.
Rail friction reduced as each branch
re-routes mid-poem. Pebble ballast,
clues for travelers, picked up
from the poet’s subgrade.
Windowsill Pie
Periwinkle blossoms dot the field. We run,
hands touching petals, a sea of blue in our wake.
Wild in our joy. Our tiny fingers plunge
into deep, sweet indigo — snatched. Blueberry stains
tell the tale. We stumble and laugh,
hands ripe with sapphires. We couldn’t get enough.
All that’s left are cobalt dribbles.
© Serena Agusto-Cox
Serena Agusto-Cox is a Pushcart Prize nominee, editor at The Mid-Atlantic Review published by DayEight, contributing writer of Washington Unbound, and coordinator of poetry programming at the Gaithersburg Book Festival. Her poems appear in multiple magazines and anthologies. She founded Savvy Verse & Wit and Poetic Book Tours, respectively, to help other poets market their work. Echoes Carry, published by Beltway Editions, is her debut poetry collection.