Tulip

by Nate Pritts

1

Every year it’s the same damn thing.
It’s constant
this dull, red ache.
Rains come in & stop

just when you think
they won’t. Long afternoons alone.

2

I feel things that aren’t there
to be felt; we have
no lasting city;
we have no ref
to say who’s right or wrong,
no umpire to say when we’re safe.

If my heart had knees
those knees would fold;
I’d admit it all
before the finger points.

3

A flimsy curtain separates
memory from imagination.

Do I remember
a better life than this?


Nate Pritts took his BS at SUNY Brockport, his MFA from Warren Wilson College and his Ph.D. from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. Currently, he teaches at the Louisiana School for Math, Science and the Arts, a residential high school for gifted students,& at Northwestern State University. His poems have recently appeared in Rattle, Cimarron Review, Solo, Dogwood and 5am.

Nate Pritts was nominated for Poets Under 30 by the storySouth editors.