“Remain”
Two thirds of the moon
dissolves into day.
The poems are leaving me
again. I only wanted
to watch them twirl
through near-blue sky,
where the crows call
as long as they must
and the rain falls
into each crack
it can find. What is
human loneliness
but this soft
decay. Leave me
by the window
where I can feel
free of everything,
but please
come back
the moment I am.
“Ashbery”
I sometimes wonder
who will do the kissing
when the sun burns out.
My roommate tells me
metaphor is an attempt
at illumination, which means
when it’s gone
we will have no metaphor
for metaphor. We might
only grow fonder for what
is out of reach, without
words for the feeling,
only black velvet
space surrounding the moon.
I can imagine a future in which
no one will do the kissing
except the poems
in the darkness of day
where their meaning will remain
hidden.
_____________
Josiah Nelson is an MFA in Writing student and sessional lecturer at the University of Saskatchewan. His work has appeared (or is forthcoming) in Existere, Vast Chasm Magazine, Queen's Quarterly, Hunger Mountain Review, and the Rumpus. He placed third in Fractured Lit’s Monsters, Mystery, and Mayhem contest. He lives in Saskatoon.
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