Gus Peterson

Ode to Nose Hair

Like the first hyacinths
suddenly there one April morning,
purple punch bruising
the brown matte of earliest spring.
Silver thicket in the cave mouth,
what is the secret of such
reckless abandon?
To come out of nowhere
and be everywhere
having been there always.
The way, according to Google,
Death Valley receives two
once in a thousand year storms
and for weeks becomes
a meadow of flowers with a lake.
To be, according to Google,
perfectly natural. Part of a process,
the winding down, a bouquet
brandished as a peace offering
in all the doorways of you:
O remorseful body, know
there is no need to apologize.
This is your last chance, again.
I take you back knowing
you will fail.

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Gus Peterson lives and writes in Maine. His work has been featured in or is forthcoming with Comstock Review, Pirene’s Fountain, New Verse News, Rattle and the Deep Water series in the Portland Press Herald edited by Megan Grumbling. A chapbook manuscript, Undiagnosis, was a finalist in The Poetry Box’s 2024 Chapbook Contest. A debut full length collection, Male Pattern, will be published in 2025 by Finishing Line Press.