Jack Anderson
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Rotation
My feet sink into the sod
of a new housing development.
This house is white.
That house is brown.
That house is darker brown.
Window to the left,
three-car garage to the right.
Women lead their golden retrievers,
listening to Katy Perry in tank tops and Nike hats.
Ford trucks creep atop crackless asphalt
with deer-blinding headlights.
My phone rings
like horses stampeding
and the sky waxes ultraviolet.
Stars flash behind midnight wisps
of jet engine wake. Thunder roars
above the Serengeti. It’s God.
God tells me
my father had a stroke.
Don’t worry, God says,
It’s minor, but feeling’s gone
in his left hand.
And wouldn’t you
believe it? Just then,
the Earth rotated
under me.
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Jack Anderson (he/him) is an MFA Candidate in Poetry at Wichita State University. His work has been published in Door=Jar and Greyhound Journal. He was a finalist for the 16th Annual Naugatuck River Review Narrative Poetry Contest. When he’s not watching The Simpsons, he wonders why James Tate never wrote about Kansas City. He told me to tell you that poetry is awesome and should never die. So don't let it. Instagram: @jack.anders0n