tree

Deciduous

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

     organ of the trees ring
                                             the heart’s synthetic beating

         the stepstep crunch
                                               of leaves a drumbreathe

                  tenderly

 

                the forest i lose
                              me          the eye leaves

 

       somewhere someone sees me

                                                        whose real
                                                                             branch

                                              of body

 

                                     how corporeal the limbs
                               these purple nights return

 

(originally published in Kettle Blue Review, Fall 2018)

Christmas Tree

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

the christmas tree represents unity meaning in this room we want each other blue
lights intertwined with pines green and lust thus we hang our ornaments
watch the tree shed its skin onto dog-dusty floor. there are hooks and angels angled
in the high-up spots you asked me to reach sharing the sangria with melting ice.
we light the darkest corner of our poorly-lit living room charlie brown
christmas piano guiding jazz strokes onto our wandering hands gliding up and down
bark needle and sharp.

 

(originally published in Abstract Magazine, Fall 2017)

American Prayer

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

Why did an apple tree
grow in my backyard?
That’s where the swimming
pool was supposed to go.

I ask not for much.

A well-placed tornado, maybe.
Another plague, perchance,
to rot its every root.

Then a demon, perhaps.
Lucifer the Lumberjack,
chainsaw in hand,
could tempt the tree
with Eve, eat its fruits,
then chop it down, though
trees don’t love women
like I do.

Look, I know it’s not practical.
Jesus didn’t wear a crown of thorns
from an apple tree
but I bear a malus cross
and don’t want to give money
to a heathen
who cuts down
a tree for me.
I could do that by myself,
if I really wanted to. I really
want to buy that pool.

I’m tired of the silence.
I know it’s easier for you
to use your superpowers
to turn the tree into a Bible
that smells like a chomped-in
red delicious. If you do that
I will sue you.

 

(originally published in Cake & Grapes – Vol. I, Issue II)