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.
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.