You’ll Miss Me When I’m Gone
In the charmed woods of our own
delusion we come face to face with
the animals. Here, animals
have the names of humans and
humans have the names of
no one. A gathering of
feather and scale, a sorry gulp
for every howl. We bow without
introduction, unable to jerry-
rig a syntax for this
long misrule, a language
of all verbs. All huff. Where to even
begin? Tender swoop and jewels
flung groundward. Where to even
go? The sun will come up cashed
and impossible, but as the midnight smoke
rises to the moon, we lie down hand-
in-hand, gone in the old way and
celebrating nothing.
Holy Roller
We never did find
love in the cities.
On the way home
the sky is red, but
it’s nothing special.
The specialness lives
in the threats and
the possibilities, in
the thought that
maybe we could
look like those
old movie heroes and
light up a Lucky Strike,
maybe two.
(The marketing has
worked on me,
I guess.) Small town
detour: now there’s a car
speeding down
the main street.
Am I the driver or
the figure at walk,
crossing under
the constant moon?
It’s always like that,
isn’t it? Are you
the force in motion
or the force at rest?
They cross. Red light
on the sole traffic
stop. I look out
and see my double
pause to look back,
wind in my hair and
a sparkle in my eye.
Curious. Happy
even. The home-
coming king that
for so long I
could not create,
could not deliver
or dare into
existence. He walks
away. The light
changes. I
change. We all
change. And
for whom? A train’s sighs
lay down in the distance
like some reverse
Lazarus. I drive out
of town, jump back
on the highway,
so anxious to
go home, get gone—
ready to flee
that which I
can neither have
nor be.
Jeremiah Moriarty is a queer writer from Minneapolis. His poems and stories have appeared in The Rumpus, No Tokens, Puerto del Sol, Catapult, Breakwater Review, and elsewhere.