Emergence
Image: “Desperado” by G.J. Gillespie. “Emergence” was written by Chris Kaiser for Rattle’s Ekphrastic Challenge, January 2024, and selected as the Artist’s Choice.
Use Your Words
My son looks up from drawing plants with teeth,
says, “You’re long-gone when we’re at Dad’s,” then tries
to find a better green. I think I’ll weep,
or maybe raise my hand and give him five.
Asteroids as Big as Skyscrapers
We should come up with better ways
to define the size of an asteroid.
One headline likens Asteroid 2008 OS7
to a football stadium, as if we are in the habit
of measuring distance in sports arenas set end-to-end;
Motel Surrender
Lovers come best together when they come
undone, empty-handed, rendered dumb,
come down to their last card, a turning
way past desperation and cleaner burning.
Audio, Poems, Poets Respond
Cocoa Ghazal
Metaphor: my skin and my hair taste like cocoa.
Real life: grandparents kiss under trees heavy with cocoa.
As girls, we’d creak down the steep Dutch stairs,
return with mugs bursting with creamy hot cocoa.
Love to But
To decline, to refuse, dig in one’s heels, to resist like a
small dog its leash—I find that gesture so alluring, such a sweet, guilty
pleasure.