The morning is
no easier. Behind pinkish clouds,
a solid red breaks through, blinding me
with brightness. So tired am I of it all,
having stayed hopeful the day
before, which turned into evening,
which turned into night, which turned into anxiety.
And despair. And resignation.
If there are birds serenading the growing light,
I don’t hear them.
I don’t see them. Instead of cawing, I hear clapping.
Instead of chirping, I hear cheering.
Must be on the other side,
separated as we are by our own horizons.
Then I hear a voice call out.
Below orange skies, she sings to me, to us.
Flocked as we are, we trill in response.
I start to see more than shadow,
a glimmer that’s far away, easy to ignore.
Something to which I hope to awake.

~

Jonathan Fletcher holds a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from Columbia University School of the Arts.  His work has been featured in numerous literary journals and magazines, and he has won or placed in various literary contests.  A Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominee, he won Northwestern University Press’s Drinking Gourd Chapbook Poetry Prize contest in 2023, for which he will have his debut chapbook, This is My Body, published in 2025.  Currently, he serves as a Zoeglossia Fellow and lives in San Antonio, Texas.