“We don’t get back / those days we don’t caress, don’t make love” — Jim Harrison
In the hostel courtyard, the Israeli girl
and I spoke in Spanish for hours, laughing
when an abuelita asked if we were pololeando
June 17, 2 BC
.1 degree
When she stripped off her sweaty clothes
in the shared bunk room, I averted my stare,
avoided the sin of skin, of bare want
July 24, 366 AD
.5 degrees
At dusk, we passed each other on the dusty
street —what words were exchanged?—but
I foolishly followed my belly to a bowl
of desert quinoto instead
November 16, 605 AD
.8 degrees
Late that night, the astronomy tour guide
texted: I hear there’s a break in the clouds
so he and I barreled down the scything road,
past barren ridges and curupiric crags
August 20, 961 AD
.7 degrees
Venus and Jupiter smoldered as one entity,
reminiscent of the time they clasped into
retrograde motion above Bethlehem
October 13, 1352 AD
.4 degrees
We skidded off the tongue of black asphalt
licking the refinery lights of distant Calama
as the glowing orbs overhead ached to fuse
January 1, 1783 AD
.6 degrees
Knee-deep in gravel, a penitent poet
with an eye to a viewfinder, who am I
to speak of two planets feeling anything?
Of their metallic cores attracting desire?
June 30, 2015 AD
.3 degrees
To seem so near, passing in the night,
to be five hundred fourteen million miles
away from ever touching the other.
–
Ben Groner III (Nashville, TN), recipient of a Pushcart Prize nomination and Texas A&M University’s 2014 Gordone Award for undergraduate poetry, has work published in Rust + Moth, GASHER, Cheat River Review, Midway Journal, Stirring, and elsewhere. He’s also a former bookseller at Parnassus Books.