Gifts of the South

An Eclipse

The moon, red
like fat dripping
from the porterhouse
side of the T-Bone,
an American God
in its own rites.
Beef moon, nurturing
our ebb and flow
with hands that knead
us to tenderness
and umami. Then,
a cleanse, clean as gin
straight up tasting like
clear night sky.

A Supercell

I thought it too much
to cull storms, but flailed
hail that punctured metal
rooftops. I spun wind
with my wanting
into the fabric of air.
In that brief hour
of power outage, a moment
to rest under blue stars.

A Meteor Shower

Dust flung by the Big
Dipper, Ursa Major,
radiance at Camelopardalis.
The storm gifted two
meteors the size of fireflies—
fat, slow and glowing
over Tennessee, while
the rest of the humble
scatter lit black grass
in rolling foothills of Appalachia.

A Pastime

Moonshine—a mash
of corn and taste of dirt.
My home in glass diorama,
soon to be an empty vessel.
I tilt back my head
impossibly far until southern
roots set fire to my
throat and make still
the sounds of chords.

Christopher Petrucelli is a graduate student at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks and an associate poetry editor at Stirring a Literary collection. His poetry has appeared in Connotation Press, Rappahannock Review, Still: The Journal, and elsewhere. His chapbook, Action at a Distance, is available from UIndy’s Etchings Press.

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