Scott Silsbe

Supermoon Tonight

I wasn’t expecting this. Rain despite the shining sun

with thunder in the vicinity. And another friend gone.

Like Great Uncle Walt, I listen & wait. Try returning

to the initial idea, the first impulse. I take a chemical

inventory, attempt to balance out the joy and sadness.

Thinking maybe I write the same thing over and over.

Why is that? Perhaps I’m the only one who can write it.

I hear on the radio that there’ll be a supermoon tonight.

I’m not sure I’ll catch it, but it’s good to know about it,

to know that there are still superheroes and supermoons

looking out for us. I ask my father how his trip went and 

he says, “I went to new places and saw beautiful things.”

“Get you some beauty, Dad,” I think. I would like to see

the Bridge of Bernini Angels again, someday, maybe—

at least I have my memories. It looks like I missed a call

from my mother. I check and there’s a message from her 

asking me, “Did you see it? Did you see the moon tonight?”

 

Scott Silsbe was born in Detroit in 1978. His work has been published

in magazines & online publications and has been collected in four books—

Unattended Fire, The River Underneath the City, Muskrat Friday Dinner,

and Meet Me Where We Survive. He is also the editor of Low Ghost Press.