english

Proofreading

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

I know

       I know

   if I can understand you    I am an asshole

        but I want you to do well

             I want you to write in the sun
barefoot on brick with birds humming from their bones

               what is a comma
                        but a fucking shadow scythe

         who cares
                          if the number eight
                                           is spelled 8

                or synonymous with infinity?

                you know more than I do
                this I know of all of you

(originally published in Penmen Review, Summer 2022)

After I See Your Post About Visiting L.A.

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

I reach out– longing for connection.
When surrounded by seagulls, I look

for the first semblance of friend. Not
that we have much to anchor anymore,

conversationally. Dolzani’s English class.
I didn’t read assigned books. Didn’t

become The Old Man and The Sea. So
many years to make safe passage. My voice

was a heavy, closed hardcover, whispering
through class as pages turned, and here

I am, strange and estranged, gazing out
over the Pacific, waiting for your response

on my seashell phone. Any sign of humanity
meant I would try. You never answer, anyway.

I unmoor my flaming boat to the coming
monsoon, scrape my hand against burning

plank to gather first ashes. I write my name in
soot. I hold my breath and swoosh into the next

life: the hold-on-to-me, the help-me, the drive-
aimlessly-through-your-twenties until arriving,

at last, at another confused island, a new
decade of drifting through cloudless nights.

(originally published in Cacti Fur, Summer 2021)

Junior Year English

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

In front of me in class. The long strokes
of chalk on board. I first whispered jokes

only you could hear. When we were face-
to-face I lost my wit. Young me in headlight

love neutralized by it. Your dad was a dentist
so I polished my yellow teeth. And yours

were gleams of white that guarded words!
I wrote what you said in journals to keep

them secret in my heart. For everyone
I have since loved I keep the language.

 

(originally published in Loch Raven Review, Spring 2019)

To Paige (From Jack)

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

no one else spell w – a –
l – k jus ta invigarate

our senses & tendons
jus me & u, ta be outside

& sniff da wine in roses, .

when ya dance arms a whirlwind i dont speak
cuz i kno a days come we both dancin

& howlin, listen da moon whisprin secrets
& i dont want ya palms leave my full belly

da way da sun snatch ya gone in mornins.

dont want u to wake : it mean some
time u stay , other time da wooden gate

outside squeak & take u where my nose
cant find u, , sometime fa days . i chew

on bones u gave til my tongue become
a skeleton thirstin . , i wait fa blue sky

ta stop ringin da sun , when da day turn
gray , when u somehow materalize ..

dats when i have u : darkness : u sleepin
on ya bed a bleach & purple catmint .

i pray da bright awful requiem dont
replay– when u rise i wonder if

today u turn ta harmony , , or void
& how long . but

wid u beside me ,
no need ta wonder .–

u,, protected , & me ,
nose fulla ya petals ,

da sauvignon in roses .

 

(originally published in Sediments Literary-Arts Journal, Autumn 2016)