Great Greats family hatbox rolls beneath her hands asking, do cedar balls burn daguerreotype was shocked, melted every one so recent, the southern way to tinder buildings and her carriage seemed to be of two minds homestead barn’s drip of rainwater on the pig’s folded ear twitch tin basin sloshed heavy water and shoulders slant and shoulders bent toward the father the comfort fire only imagined mother’s family’s livestock was brick, thought them in a century after, sun streamers through carriage windows hatpins long and ear splitting, while broad-shouldered uncles look on hungrily, the type that lumber through a door but whisper in libraries your hat red with ribbons a feather, look at teacup move it to the patch of firelight something that belonged to me, but as one gets older
Jeffrey Kingman lives by the Napa River in Vallejo, California. His poetry chapbook, ON A ROAD, was published by Finishing Line Press in December of 2019. He is the he winner of the Red Berry Editions 2015 Broadside Contest, the winner of the 2018 Eyelands Book Award for an unpublished poetry book, a finalist in the 2018 Hillary Gravendyk Prize poetry book competition, and he received honorable mention in the 2017 Quercus Review Press Fall Poetry Book Award. He has been published in PANK, Crack the Spine, Squaw Valley Review, and others. Jeff has a Master’s degree in Music Composition and has been playing drums in rock bands most of his life. Visit his website at www.jeffkingman.com