Heath Joseph Wooten
Per Diem
I could not have seen myself so alone.
I could not have predicted this
unshaven Sunday.
I was diffuse as old hair. The day was
an eagle and passed like a sickle. I
sorted through old reams of fingers and
found you. A thin crust of dust.
Seeing you, I regretted my fascination
with fruit. I tried to believe I was divine.
I found I was atomized like language or
spit. You, meanwhile, remained a
molehill. A ripe night.
Such days lack a solution. I drank. I
thought of you. The neighbor’s roof
acquired by sunset a logic that said you
could never be so warm.
I accepted that butterfat burns quick but
I remained incredulous about the spider
by the front door.
Do you remember. How the wind could
pass through the web. How its web
remained day after day, as if it had
forgotten the consequences of touch.
Heath Joseph Wooten (he/him) is a creature in Northern Michigan who fried chicken twice last week. He received his MFA in poetry from Northern Michigan University, and he edits for Passages North and Hominum Journal. When he's not writing poetry (most of the time), he's considering glass and selling liquor.
Return to November 2023 Edition
I could not have seen myself so alone.
I could not have predicted this
unshaven Sunday.
I was diffuse as old hair. The day was
an eagle and passed like a sickle. I
sorted through old reams of fingers and
found you. A thin crust of dust.
Seeing you, I regretted my fascination
with fruit. I tried to believe I was divine.
I found I was atomized like language or
spit. You, meanwhile, remained a
molehill. A ripe night.
Such days lack a solution. I drank. I
thought of you. The neighbor’s roof
acquired by sunset a logic that said you
could never be so warm.
I accepted that butterfat burns quick but
I remained incredulous about the spider
by the front door.
Do you remember. How the wind could
pass through the web. How its web
remained day after day, as if it had
forgotten the consequences of touch.
Heath Joseph Wooten (he/him) is a creature in Northern Michigan who fried chicken twice last week. He received his MFA in poetry from Northern Michigan University, and he edits for Passages North and Hominum Journal. When he's not writing poetry (most of the time), he's considering glass and selling liquor.
Return to November 2023 Edition