we pray angels met you on the shore by Jason Baldinger

don’t know about your apocalypse

but I ‘m running out end times

shuddering down a dirt mountain road

in a new used car I paid cash

on the barrelhead for

dust cloud in the rear view

rises with morning mist 

keep alternating whiplash

juice gas then brake

that drop off

into the creek 

gives me the side eye

I’m sniffing out a trail head

trying to find a mountain

to dose space dust with

I hear it before I smell it

goddamn those old mother mountains

are whistling o danny boy 

evidently every damn word

etched in my dna

sing along, try not to get myself 

weepy eyed melancholy

then it dawns on me

that ain’t the fucking mountains

it’s an actual set of bagpipes

sweet and sour tone all over

this rushing morning stream

sun clears that side of the mountain

blind a moment

slow to realize

I am locking eyes

with a goddamn bagpipe playing bigfoot

in tartan kilt and full regale

I’ve watched the patterson-gimlin film

I’m in no way starstruck

this is another awkward moment 

in a lifetime of them

there’s nothing to see

only notes stuck in the dust

we pray that angels met you on the shore

Jason Baldinger is a poet and photographer from Pittsburgh, PA.  He’s penned fifteen books of poetry the newest of which include: The Afterlife is a Hangover (Stubborn Mule Press) and A History of Backroads Misplaced: Selected Poems 2010-2020 (Kung Fu Treachery), and This Still Life (Kung Fu Treachery) with James Benger. His first book of photography, Lazarus, is forthcoming. His work has appeared across a wide variety of print journals and online. You can hear him read his work on Bandcamp and on lps by The Gotobeds and Theremonster.