When Josh lingers at the end
of the workday, I think of Stand
By Me: kids’ backs covered
in leeches in the woods–
can’t push away or peel
him off, his limb-thin branches
that walk out into the dark
parking lot and back in
to bug us, again and
again, scribbling his
footprints all over concrete
in a scuffmark infinity.
I have never seen someone
so happy to have shot someone.
He returned one
weekend from Albany,
roaring with energy, eager
to tell the whole office
that burglars stole half-
million dollar lamps
from his house, but he’s
glad they did not get it
all, and how he perched
for several hours on his
staircase, alongside the fading
sun– the story convoluted
and convulsed in his hands,
the several times I heard
it told in the hallway,
in the kitchen, showing
photos of hideous antiques.
He claims to know they would
be coming. And that he
was getting updates
on the critical person’s
condition, and the words
come bursting out of his
mushroom cloud mouth
that he would have loved.
(originally published in Toasted Cheese Literary Magazine, Spring 2024)
pennsylvania
Closure
there is no end
to wanting a better
anything. I have
driven through
stop signs on rural
roads in afternoon
light envisioning
the reality where
I have arrived
faster at our house
and you’re happy
about it for those
few extra seconds
but time is fog
that dissipates
anyway, being
that yesterday
we loved each other
and today we
are sitting at the top
of the stairs to our
bedroom petting
the cat who survived
our downfall
and mourning the one
whose heart clotted
because of it. you
notice bubbles of
water in the blue
textured wall and
we burst into
the day’s remainder,
moving temporary
belongings around
again, this time
with no effort
of emotion, no pull-
each-other-closer
because the house
has seen its share
of endings and
beginnings, I’m
sure, if we are
to frame it in
those terms
already the memories
have taken control.
(originally published in OPEN: a journal of arts & letters, Fall 2024)
I have been drowning in work
but the sun still floats past 8 PM
& I wonder where time went
sunk in the blue glow
of overheating machines
it is Monday
and everyone hates Mondays
because this past weekend
I went to a house concert
in the state I once lived in
only to return to the wheel
and drive a few marathons
windows open music loud
past spontaneous roadkill
and honeybee fields
last night I slept on a pile
of unsigned documents
dreamt of paper cuts
and Parochial school
I bought green bananas
for the office
and by the end
of the day
they were brown
(originally published in The /temz/ Review, Spring 2025)
The Shrubs of Doubt Were Misplaced
Still, the dogs watch me from behind
a fence when I walk the opposite route–
against traffic on Gross Street–
the view changes enough to convince
me I am in a different place in my life
with its industrial constellations,
a parking garage sparkling with hovering
hospital lights while skeleton neighbors
decorate homes for Halloween and blue
jays all seek a different weather. Maybe
October chill has knocked a new belief
into my teeth. Brick by brick I walk
by buildings of my past that survived
into the current, too, and a leaf
from an unseen tree floats
onto the chest of my charcoal
jacket. I pin it there
for the days I will forget.
(originally published in Ariel Chart, Spring 2024)
Summer to Spring
Sadness is a chewable tablet
in the fall. The riptide
returns with a little less
water in the hourglass
than yesterday. There is a bottle
with your name on it, a plastic
orange, pills you don’t believe in
but I believe in you and your bare-
branch will. Every year it all ends
and each time,
leaves appear again.
(originally published in Chronogram, Spring 2025)
On a Zoom Call with the World
the crows are stage left with nails in their beaks
it took centuries for modern civilization to collapse
but it is happening now and we are all here for it
looking toward the future (naïve to hold a telescope)
I see ants collapsed just outside a giant mound of
peanut butter powder coated in poison we were
feeding ourselves (and we fed so long) with words
and power with which we chose to destroy ourselves
and we are all here for it drowning in the rising seas
(originally published in Flights, Fall 2023)
Stand
I am begging for you to be well.
At Spirit in Lawrenceville.
Lung cancer
I can’t
stand this for you. I
love you enough to know
this world
is too crowded without
you & me standing
around, heads bobbing,
at another live show
at a smoky dive bar,
asking each other
what we want next
& how much more
dearly in this life can
we stand to lose?
(originally published in Ink Pantry, 2025)
The Film
Sometimes I sit at a café window
watching pedestrians pass and I think
all the people in this life I’ll never
know, these strangers in the space
we share, an unseen assistant
director setting up the scene and
critics will leave harsh reviews for lack of
dramatic irony, or subtle comedy, whatever
the previous scene sets up, or seemed to
be leading to, but the longer I move
through its runtime, the more I fear
a lack of coherence, that Chekhov’s
son never grows into what Chekhov
demands– the boy dies a few acts
later, randomly, and still the film marches
on, aiming the lens high toward some plastic
profundity with its pervasive god
and blue sky gazing through a tall
circle of trees, leaves swaying, keyboard
guitar, so frustrating, and later will be an op-ed
from the Production Coordinator that outlines
the sacrifices needed when the rented lens
shattered, dropped from a rooftop, costing a
hundred thousand, and the producers had yelled
about budget cuts yet still wanted an endless
duration, excess cast members extricated with
no follow-up but others too much, your dead
dad referenced with each hailstorm, you grow
tired of the metaphor then sit in the park
watching people pass when a past lover
from act twenty-seven enters stage left
with a pup and you wave, a stunt, restless
limb, in case she asks, which she won’t,
she’ll avoid eye contact because she is
no longer in the contract, can’t say a word
without pay, but still she will
wonder if you are the same actor,
and I’ll have to rewind a long while
to see if you are.
(originally published in A God You Believed In [Pinhole Poetry, 2023])
Quarantine (Day 60 – May 14, 2020)
you threaten me with a walk
outside I acquiesced but the rain
came anyway and ended the plan
for temporary freedom in the confines
of codes covered up for the necessary
health & safety of others I love who
might love me if I could hold their
gaze for more than a moment
(originally published in Ink in Thirds, Fall 2023)
Rectangular Rainbow
The clouds induce trance on the drive
home from work today. White sheep pile
atop each other on a ranch in Montana
until the weight of an oncoming storm
that never comes except for a stub of
rainbow that peeks from behind far hills.
In the open stretch of highway it reveals itself
as a rectangle floating in the middle of cerulean,
squiggly lines across it, a glitch of physics
my phone cannot capture. I text you from
the middle lane– soaring eighty– because
you love rainbows. You say you walked
around our block but could not find it.
When I arrive home I am filled with unknown,
spiritual vigor. We split a red, frozen pizza
then leave for a journey following our favorite
clouds above, on high alert for the rainbow.
Guided by pink translucent clouds in blue
outlines, you ask me holistically, what are your
career goals? I can’t stop searching upward,
awestruck by the air and rare beauty
in the world, in the center of our elevated
city of bridges and transitions and roads
that fall into each other in chaos you
must understand to survive. The sunset
is somewhere and I know our clouds
obscure it. I know my career involves
sacrifice but I am chasing film’s thrill.
The whims of our uppermost winds!
I have taken you along.
(originally published in I-70 Review, Summer 2024)