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3 Poems by James Croal Jackson

 

To Kingsford (from DQ)

You knew my name, pulled me
from the dark. How many times
have I died? How many alive?
I was a ghost. A breath. You 
caught my scent. Made me flesh.

Tectonics

I am the great disappointment. I promise 
I’ll be there, but I am such a failure that 
as soon as I promise I won’t I will be
just incredible! Joyous at my sudden 
shift in tectonics, we will walk
along the path of love toward future
and I will fall again into a crack
of my own seismic creation. I will
tell you one thing and the Richter
will tell you I’m lying I love you
I’m crushed beneath the mass 
of climate chaos happening 
to this world
and to us.


No Matter How We Love

reservoir fading skies 
the greenest pine 
needles tarantulas or 
wedding vows jodhpurs 
light silk sweat turtles amid
mountains two ducked hearts 
murder in love a frozen deer 
splinters of metal your abandoned 
democracy you begin to run your 
arms through the mists smugness 
aloft the fruit of late season you 
awake to feet of crystal stone 
naked on a grass paradise plot 
of your father’s estate how creeks 
know of the sky’s smallest leaves 
and their immense heart scents 
of smoke the golden brown 
of the soil is actually stars 
and no matter how we love 
it does not end like a song  
our tears pour but the storm 
yes the storm dissolves 
over us like fireworks

James Croal Jackson is a Filipino-American poet in film production. His latest chapbooks are A God You Believed In (Pinhole Poetry, 2023) and Count Seeds With Me (Ethel Zine & Micro-Press, 2022). Recent poems are in The Garlic Press, Remington Review, and ONE ART. He edits The Mantle Poetry from Nashville, Tennessee.

“Invulnerable”
Michael Moreth is a recovering Chicagoan living in the rural, micropolitan City of Sterling, the Paris of Northwest Illinois.