Pissing Toward the Sky
by Jerry VanIeperen
We’re watching the eclipse
though we don’t know our astronomy.
And it’s not warm enough
to try kissing
even in breezy May.
I cannot sit
bladder full of movie soda.
Step out, look down ridge,
unzip, without
car lights or street lamps.
Just our stillborn shadow
on the moon above.
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Published in Black Rock & Sage, Idaho State University’s creative writing journal. It has since become an ISU-enrolled student publication, but 1000 years ago, it was open to anybody. A few months before this poem was accepted, I had won the undergrad creative writing contest for poetry at Utah State University, and it felt like I was on a roll and it was a special time, which I didn’t appreciate until the benefit of hindsight.
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JERRY VANIEPEREN lives heartily in Utah with two children, two dogs, and one wife. He earned an MFA from the University of Nebraska and was a founding editor of the poetry journal Sugar House Review.