Jake Sheff
Reflections of Weddings
In bad faith, to the chagrin of mothers
that tend the unwatered patches of carrots
that maintain and moor the immemorial,
I withstood the crisp and wintery brush
of pine needles that swept the bald eagles
along Lake Pepin today and all of 1890
as if the Sea Wing disaster were not
like a wedding. I resolved the crunch
underfoot, and muttered, “I want to say
those things,” like when I wandered
among the cenotes and Mayan ruins,
iguanas and rivers with rowers, swimmers
that were golfing yesterday, married
today, reciting vows like Whitman before
he drowned in the same possibilities,
saying, “I want to say those things.”
Jake Sheff is a major and pediatrician in the US Air Force, married with a daughter and six pets. Currently home is the Mojave Desert. Poems are in or forthcoming from Radius, The Ekphrastic Review, Crab Orchard Review, The Cossack Review and elsewhere. He won 1st place in the 2017 SFPA speculative poetry contest and was a finalist in the Rondeau Roundup’s 2017 triolet contest. Two of his poems have been nominated for the 2018 Best of the Net Anthology. His chapbook is “Looting Versailles” (Alabaster Leaves Publishing).
Previous: Daniel Bailey – Joy Your Heart Against Me • Issue 6 • Next: C.M. Donahue – Nomad
The Mantle 