Brandon Hansen

Earth Yet Again

Well I was mystified when the total solar eclipse
didn’t end and Allison turned to stone. Strange.

In her half-curled hand her tea went cold
and her big grey eyes gazed outside
and there was Larry, also cement, dog bouncing
on the leash like a fish on the line. Nuts.

Anyway I wandered for years and years. You all
turned to dust and like my first peek beneath a lifted shirt
I saw the entire Earth. Unbelievable.

Multitudinous truths erupted
in maple leaf veins and the stopping of my watch
and it started making sense
why nothing made sense.

I mean before. Now in constant semi-darkness
brook trout kiss fireflies
from the river’s swell and muskrats
snuggle on the dash of a Prius
half-stuck in the brook. On the rotted power pole
two owls coo for hours. Once,
one shitted on my head while I napped
beneath a willow. So be it.
Time like a long sigh
when you’re all alone
can unspool
all it wants. It’s best that way.

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Brandon Hansen is from a village in northern Wisconsin. He studied writing along Lake Superior and then trekked out to the mountains, where he earned his MFA as a Truman Capote scholar at the University of Montana. His work has been Pushcart nominated and can be found in The Baltimore Review, Quarterly West, Puerto Del Sol and elsewhere. Find him on Twitter: @BatBrandon_