THE PURSUIT

by Alejandro Escudé

Once I thought it was Nietzsche’s

Übermensch crawling up the Minority

Leader’s arm, a furry man, but no 

Sasquatch, a green hue around it.

But then I came to realize it was

Aristotle, his arched beetle back 

On the President’s shoulders, 

having lapped up the milk of logic. 

A stone cave for a poet to live in

and call out of, the trees out there

appearing as just so many lies.

One enters a labyrinth of razors

in the city, having been cooped up

in the house for many months.

Ever noticed that driving fast

is a form of geekiness? I sink

into a neutral speed, observing,

as Whitman did, the dead grass

of the center median. Airliners

crisscross the sky at different

depths of air. Nothing collides.

People only collide with them-

selves these days. Conflict, if 

it takes place at all, takes place

in whispers over false transoms. 

At night, looking up at the stars,

one sees no nature, only an urban

concentration of skyscrapers

formed of galaxies, planet rings

on-ramps and off-ramps, screams

suppressed by cynical tweets, 

statues masking WiFi towers.

I’ve been wrong before, but not

about this. Truth is dead because

truth is romantic. I bring you

to the end of this long car chase

and I bail out, a chopper over me,

its lights illuminating the way 

in or out of the television screen.

Alejandro Escudé published his first full-length collection of poems My Earthbound Eye in September 2013. He holds a master’s degree in creative writing from UC Davis and teaches high school English. Originally from Argentina, Alejandro lives in Los Angeles with his wife and two children.

BRING IT ON: A NEW YEAR'S POEM

by Aaron Poochigian

I.

For several decades I have been one cold,
one fall, one monthly bill, away from living
derelict under cardboard on the street.
Why is it, now that I am halfway old,
my mug a mug of damage and defeat,
that New Year’s has become its own Thanksgiving?
Why do I sit here typing words of praise
about the world’s largess? Why do I sing
heart-felt ballads about each silly fling
and psalms of hope about the coming days?

II.

From California I can see Times Square,
one of the chakras of America.
The ball has dropped. I’m sorry I’m not there
to add my whoop to the hysteria.

Tourists and buskers mob the streets, and you,
my friends, are wild among them. Pop the cork,
loose the confetti, sound the shrill kazoo.
I heart the mess of you, New York, New York.

Midnight has come to Minneapolis.
While, here and there, a raucous air-horn blares,
my friends from school, as wives and husbands, kiss
on couches, with their kids asleep upstairs.

Oh Uptown rife with music, theater
and Madeleine—the things I love the most.
In memory of a twenty-something blur
of poetry and wine, I raise a toast.

Cheers have gone up all over Salt Lake City.
Futurity has driven out December!
I wrote my first book there and kissed a pretty
red-haired girl (whose name I don’t remember).

I see her, hunched and fearless, on the slopes
of Alta, snowboard-footed, goggles on.
I hope that she has Rocky-Mountain hopes
for 2020 and is up till dawn.

Finally, in Pacific Standard Time,
I feel fireworks erupt at Disneyland,
and I can see my niece in Anaheim
agog in bed, stuffed elephant in hand.

Just so I journey westward, zone by zone,
while sipping whiskey at my laptop here
in Fresno, at my mother’s house, alone.
How should I resolve to spend the year?

III.

This year I will bottle
my animal candor
the way Aristotle
honed Alexander.

The redolence of
this martial spirit
will vanquish like love
all who come near it,

and a sip will lay
the taster out.
This year, I say,
will know no doubt.

Aaron Poochigian earned a PhD in Classics from the University of Minnesota and an MFA in Poetry from Columbia University. His first book of poetry, The Cosmic Purr (Able Muse Press), was published in 2012, and his second book Manhattanite, which won the Able Muse Poetry Prize, came out in 2017. His third book, American Divine, won the Richard Wilbur Award and will come out in 2020. His thriller in verse, Mr. Either/Or, was released by Etruscan Press in the fall of 2017. His work has appeared and is forthcoming in such publications as Best American Poetry, The Paris Review and POETRY.