Tuesday, January 24, 2023

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. 

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