earth

Trajectory

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

I equate falsities with wheat; groves as tea-
leaves in lands of blue sun. I confuse distance
with fair weather– idols in my mind: the beach

or Joshua trees. Golden fields have I never tilled.
Toiled, yes, in my lugubrious way, driving through
vast swaths of America, pasteurized pastures often

teeming with cows. Thinking of scale, it is
impossible to be upset at mathematics. But
I do aim anger at trajectory. For years I had

my eyes closed, pointed at a spinning globe.
When I opened them, in Mom’s basement,
my feet were planted where I remembered.

(originally published in The Drunken Llama, Summer 2021)

An Iceberg Splits from Antarctica

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

           the cicadas are out
           early don’t be
           alarmed by the
           coming swarms                              build a memory
                                                                      of winter build
                                                                      a memory of here

                                                                                I loved what we had

                                                                                        cold glove
                                                                                        in warm hand

                                            but now when growing old I know
                                            I didn’t do enough to do my part
                                            the wandering joyrides burning ghosts of
                                            dinosaurs from gunky lungs of millennium
                                            sedans cigarettes in our mouths tv the endless
                                            bedlamps they say sleep is best in total
                                            darkness o how I wasted more than I knew
                                            on those daily long commutes

(originally published in Orange Quarterly, Winter 2019)

60%

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

to stay alive I must believe I am water
inside my own body inside the river

my living an arrow shot into the forest
ghost slashed open by every stranger

who claims to walk on water when
nothing but air parting is the motion

of feet scrambling to become some
sacred proclamation it is not

 

(originally published in S/WORD, Fall 2018)

Atmosphere

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

What you do say is prayer don’t burn and die
when passing through the atmosphere.

Yet, somehow, meteoroids do–
though sand-sized, they have bodies

like bullets, sometimes
copper, sometimes steel.

We’re talkin’ heaven’s ammo,
a hundred tons pounding Earth each day

unnoticed. Down here, you claim
able to speak with some cosmic, faraway force

you’ve never met while keeping closed your mouth.
You claim telepathy, so this telepathic ability

how your thoughts move healing this world
of the aftermath of bodies. Tell me:

how does God respond?
And you say God,

God protects the faithful.

So, God’s His own meteorites
cratering His house, hallelujah.

 

(originally published in Ohio Edit, Winter 2018)

Nothing Makes Sense and I’m Glad We Understand That

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

Wait for the sun to shine past noon.
Palm trees quiver in a vortex of goosebumps.

The universe revealed itself
as a skeleton in the sky.
Vertebrae wisps, stoic.
Jets soared through bone rings
and whispered softly to faraway swans.

Gaze into the galaxy – golden
stalagmites in deep caves – we understand
that we scatter like gulls
only to congregate again
and dance above the sea.

All the swirling rainbow colors
in the reflections from puddles

unravel the universe
from a spool. As
thread slowly sways,
forget
what we understood.

 

(originally published in Syzygy Poetry Journal, Vol. I, No. II)