Backyard football. You and me. Both The Giants. Me – Katcavage, Huff. You – Conerly, Gifford. We pounded each other.
Watched the Giants win the Super Bowl.
You got cancer.
Died.
Funeral home. Before it opened. You in a suit.
I looked you in the eyes.
Said, What the fuck you doin’?
WEDDING SONG
-a triptych
Mikalah Nick
always remember
loving the
sunshine blessings
and the
birds singing
Mikalah remember
Nick weeping
loving inexpressibly
the mountains
grass reaching
endlessly the sun
brilliant flowers
spirits joyous
larger symbols
than emotions
words and
Braelynne luminous
little life
reminder that
love blossoms
bringing smiles
sweet innocence
angelic laughter
devotion
John L. Stanizzi is the author of 6 collections – Ecstasy Among Ghosts, Sleepwalking, Dance Against the Wall, After the Bell, Hallelujah Time!, and High Tide – Ebb Tide. Published widely, he’s had poems in Prairie Schooner, American Life in Poetry, The New York Quarterly, Paterson Literary Review, The Cortland Review, Rattle, Tar River Poetry, and many others. He’s been translated into Italian and appeared in El Ghibli, in the Journal of Italian Translations Bonafinni, and Poetarium Silva. New work will be out this year in L’Ombra delle Parole. His translator is Angela D’Ambra. His new collection, CHANTS, will be out in 2018 with Cervena Barva Press. John has read at venues all over New England. A former New England Poet of the Year, John teaches literature at Manchester Community College in Manchester, CT, and he lives with his wife, Carol, in Coventry.
