Spacing Out by Kenneth Pobo

Take me back to the solar system’s edge—
I miss the ample flower buds in ice.
My friend Peg went, got caught in a gas hedge,
a sulphur smell. It held her like a vice.
She got free and insisted that I go—
travel is always risky. Live boldly.
At first, I told her that I had zero
gumption. She screamed and looked at me coldly.

I packed light, made it past funky Charon,
my phone camera forgotten at home.
Who needs pictures? I tasted real moon pies,
not missing Earth much, except for barren
places where wildflowers burst out from loam
on the first warm morning when winter dies.

---

Kenneth Pobo won the 2019 chapbook contest from the State Poetry Society of Alabama for Your Place Or Mine. They published it this May. Forthcoming is a book from Assure Press called Uneven Steven.

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