alone

Forgotten Beach

/ James Croal Jackson / 1 Comment

I cannot open my eyes, nor hear the flapping
of wings, nor feel the earth beneath
the forest. I pray that I may never return to
this sinking world– I can’t imagine the thoughts
I’d think alone, resting in the sun
and letting the surf wash over me.
It’s too far to come back home and still be safe.
I’ll light another torch,
and carry a prayer that will burn forever
in the river. From rocks I will dig
and dive in. When I sink, I know
I will never return.

(originally published in Bruiser Mag, Spring 2023)

Invisibility (NYC)

/ James Croal Jackson / 1 Comment

Chin on window, I still somehow lost
myself in the crowd: the subway

left me here, at my draped destination. Yet
street guitars and strangers’ chatter echo

in the underground, eardrums thrumming through
this maze of machines: ticket-takers, escalators.

Half-shell, half-mind, I ascend into the grid
of civilization: deadened lego towers, blind

in the clouds, airplanes wending through
faint chemical composition quarter-notes.

(originally published in Pif Magazine, Summer 2019)

Old Songs

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

on the phone you ask
who old lyrics were written for
I say my writing is not literal
these are imaginary girls

you ask who are these imaginary girls
I say they are lonely
in imaginary ways they alone imagine
the ways they are lonely

I lay under a dim fluorescent bulb
a soft cotton sheet on my skin
digging a deeper crater in my bed
as in a bodiless void

 

(originally published in Bitterzoet Magazine, 2017)