John Dorsey is the former Poet Laureate of Belle, MO. He is the author of several collections of poetry, including Which Way to the River: Selected Poems: 2016-2020 (OAC Books, 2020), Sundown at the Redneck Carnival, (Spartan Press, 2022, and Pocatello Wildflower, (Crisis Chronicles Press, 2023). He may be reached at archerevans@yahoo.com.

A Thousand Words

for nate larson

as we drive through the hills
stopping every few miles
so you can snap photos
you talk about your daughter
about how father’s day 
always hits you hard
you play a mix you made 
to help work through the pain
but you’ll never forget she’s gone
there are a thousand different words 
for moments like this 
but i am speechless
& there’s nothing elliot smith 
can offer that will help 
you sleep through the night 
for half a second i nearly mention how alice cooper 
had a song about dead babies
that my aunt used to dance to in her underwear
but then a hawk glides over the trees
like a spirit watching over you
& you pause 
smiling
as you reach 
for your camera.

Poem for Jim Gustafson

detroit just sits there
its heart exposed
like a dirty river 
with sweaty hands
a hummingbird with one wing
that can’t remember where home is
a loaded pistol hidden in the glove compartment
between roadmaps & promises 
that gets tossed into the water
it tries to lure rosa parks into the future
with black & white memories of injustice 
with blood & rust
with factories 
with their silent whistles of hope
its babies crying
coney island sauce running down their cheeks
it's late on the rent again
& is out of excuses 
for its empty smoke stacks
& it certainly can’t afford the milk on trumbull
jim this is a heavy city
that can’t pay for its own headstone
so it has to steal the songs of the dead
from lighter hearts like yours
& leave their remains 
in a nearby toledo boneyard
where someone will find them
looking out of a bus window
at a future that has run out of gas
the alleys are as you left them
the cars just sitting there 
in the middle of the night
their engines reduced to bones
while your poems fill the potholes 
as they quietly wait to catch fire 
in the street.

Poem for Lesley

the young widow next door 
doesn't talk about her dead husband
instead she talks over the summer breeze
that moves right through the grass
& dances across the deck outside my window
just like the nutcracker 
that comes in with the frost
settling on the kitchen floor
hoping for a little light holiday music
but it’s sunny out right now
maybe there isn’t all that much to say
his footsteps danced like hummingbirds
but they’re gone now
when he was still here 
she had a heart like a window box full of light
but now she writes poems for her daughters 
just so they can remember the lines on his face 
she listens to the counting crows in the car
on her way home in the dark
to wipe out the damage 
that thinking about the past does
singing along at the top of her lungs
even after she’s made it through the driveway
so she won’t hear him 
come through the door
like a memory
even after she’s changed the locks.