by Christine Potter

Among the red bell peppers that aren’t even organic,
Ziplock bags and detergent and cube steak, fake
butterscotch chips for holiday baking, and Christmas

wrap out way early, this! This hug, this smile, this old
friend who didn’t ghost you after all, this Yes. This
Yes, of course as unseen nozzles mist the fresh herbs.

Really Diz, really Bird, really Slam Stewart on bass.
In this shadowless place of milk so homogenized
it won’t cottage cheese your coffee for weeks. In this

place where everything crinkles in cellophane, happy
ghosts blowing joy: Oh, yeah, it’s cool, it’s cool. And
then a few days later in the same store: Caravan, “All

The Way,” from Blind Dog At St. Dunstan’s: synth,
drums, prog rock from 1976, nameable only by total
obsessives but sweet as dulce de leche ice cream and

the encouraging scent of fresh celery! In a world so
well-married to woe that even the wars have to line up
and vie for your attention each morning, a complex

secret handshake, a compliment on the cool hat you
forgot you’d worn. The President of the World
flashing a peace sign. Three green lights going home.

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Christine Potter ‘s poetry has been curated by Rattle, Kestrel, Third Wednesday, Thimble, Eclectica, The Midwest Quarterly, and Autumn Sky Poetry Daily—and featured by ABC Radio News. She has work forthcoming in The McNeese Review. Her young adult novels, The Bean Books, are published by Evernight Teen, and her third full-length collection of poetry, Unforgetting, Kelsay Books.

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NB: Click on the title to open a page which contains an audio version of today’s poem.