I Never Considered My Grandparents

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

Whom I never met, would be buried in Akron,
the backdrop of sleepless drunk nights, wandering
park properties as if I owned them in my boisterous
consumption, alive but for the thrill of spending
time with those I wish eternity upon, gathered
before me the gargoyles, the hellraisers, the love
I could burrow underneath rain-pocked heartache,
one golden anniversary away from immortality
on a slab of stone drunk kids can stumble over
and plant their knees in the recycled mud.

(originally published in Impspired, Summer 2023)

Bro

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

Get out of my life with
your blue Trump signs. Don’t
tell me what stakes
you stuck in your front lawn.
Come on. I know you’re not
a boomer. You say we’re at
a crossroads and I gaze
into the neighbor’s yard–
used to be bushes concealing
every outside path. Now there’s
someone on a lawnmower severing
the bonds of grass, in intervals,
each direction I look, each time
I visit home. And we comment
each new motor makes it harder
to reach each other. Mom’s
neighbors want to beat the rain.
We just built this fire in the back
of my childhood home. These
bundles of sticks my mom gathers,
waiting for us to come home
some early October Saturday.
At my brother’s first mention
of herd immunity, my sister
suggests we seek more kindling
in the tall grass. The air is
parched but we must keep
burning. Firewood left from Dad’s
death we’ve already forgotten.
My brother says we’re gonna
lose all this country fought for–
Dad survived World War II
only to shatter his ribs on a fire
hydrant sixty years later. Mom
would not let the coroner dig
into his carcass for an autopsy.
In his later years, Dad would keep
a hose beside our bonfires. Still,
we hunch over heat together,
burning hot dogs on forgotten
skewers. We dredge the past
again: a year after my father’s death,
cooking hot dogs over walnut husks,
one of you said there could be
an industry for the timbered taste
coating the tenuous meat we’ve
shared over the years.

(originally published in Alternate Route, Spring 2023)

It’s Complicated

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

Sure, I know the DJ at Belvedere’s tonight
but that is all I have. My body is an ocean
liner that imagined a destination when
departing, but lost its way mid-voyage
while passengers scream it’s okay!
It’s okay!
                  On simple days
I open the window and watch
clouds pass with my long-hair
cat, breathing in the breeze like
we’ve both never been outside
before, trying to find some
comfortable place to rest
with the rail jutting up,
a dull blade.

(originally published in Ink Sac, Summer 2023)

The View at Work: Dump Trucks

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment 
Look at this kingdom of garbage 
trucks. A survey underneath 
the 31st St. Bridge, where I spend
my horrible days collecting.
It is Friday night and there is
pressure to deliver. I told you
nothing we do here is important,
so take a deep breath. Smell
the compost of contemporary
capitalism. My blue brain
has ceased to need a function.
My winter is every man’s
desire for himself. It is waiting
for my back to give and bear
the weight of the waste: 
the compacted nature of my life,
squandering, squandering,
squandering the ineffable.

(originally published in A God You Believed In - Pinhole Poetry, 2023)

Strangers with Appreciation

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

IN BOUNDLESS EXPANSE
BETWEEN JOB AND SILENCE
NOSTALGIA AND THE EVER-
LIVING PRESENT I SIT IN FRONT
OF A PROJECTOR SCREEN
COOLED BY THE WINDOW
UNIT I CAN DERIVE NO
MORE MEANING TO VIDEO
GAMES NO
                               it is the purpose of a stranger to dream
                               for me to be engaged so in his fever
                               your creativity is what I want
                               now that I don’t have the rapturous
                               privilege of losing myself
               but haven’t I
          wrestled with every single
whim every whistle
   of the wind that calls for me
I answer
                               for a little while then reach then
                        ASK NO QUESTIONS
                        FOR ANSWERS I COULD NEVER KNOW
                        THE MEANING OF THE STARS NOR
MY PLACE WITHIN MY BRAIN WHERE
                        THE SOUL SITS
                 it’s sick sometimes in
                 how I want to be someone else???
                 but I look at old pictures of myself
                 and think he’d be so happy to see
                 how unrecognizable he is to himself

(originally published in confetti, Fall 2023)

This Vestibule

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

& within this vestibule the sighing & side-glances,
demands for just-asked-for jackets, & axes dealt
to execs in their excess, & star-born nephews needing
validation; & on this thin strip of wooden walkway,
in the gaze of dead deer, a floor air bubble that shocks
& wilders passers-by who have walked upon it one
thousand times, beside the gunshots on television
(free film school for everyone!) where we have
seen passive-aggression, passing gremlins, & a red-
state journeyman who lusts for connection along-
side extras lost from fittings (if they just turned right
past the blue truck, an open door you can’t see
from here, here, where we have waited for a call
sheet for hours), & once, there was a heavy storm
& we watched a CATERING cone withstand
the rain & hail & screeching wind & we were on the
inside, too, through the glass, rooting everyone on–
yet hollered in catharsis when it tumbled down.

(originally published in Osmosis Press, Fall 2023)

The Doubt That Follows Improv Class

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

Projection meaning screen is blurry.
I don’t want any part of.

Correct. I ended improv
class inspecting
my anxious habits–

has it been too long?
my demons asked.

                            I could not
answer honestly. Walked
away and waved
to the prospective
attention of no one.

Still, when clouds
are classically beautiful
I recall the simple mistakes.

No one counts
their turns, no one
passes their
inhibitions.

I scan the sky
for a piece of absolution.

Such indelicate pertinence,
this honest-to-however-many-
times I treat myself
like a stray without looking
away.

(originally published in Yellow Mama Magazine, Fall 2024)

Shoppers

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

At Westside Pavilion, I watch shoppers
walk slowly to their Jubilees, carrying plastic

bags of silk and thread to the thrum of Monday.
I shop enough inside my hungry flesh, living

in my Ford, booking tiny television gigs to
replace my shoes. Sometimes, I am able to

watch myself in the lens of a softer society–
playing voyeur to my temporary belonging.

(originally published in Communicators League, Fall 2021)