Peter Herring

Northern White Rhinos

Each word precludes all other words. That’s why
I write so many poems. To give an example
of this right now Jupiter is closer to Earth
than it has been for 59 years, closer than it will be
for another 100 plus change. I’m dazzled, as
I’m sure you are, but in another corner of the sky
the stars turn black. Northern white rhinos
appeared on earth 50,000,000 years ago. Now
there are 2 females left. While your heart
breaks over this I’m writing a poem about rain
in the desert. So many drops, none falling on me,
make it hard to describe each one, to resurrect
the feeling of wet. When I say yellow blue deserts
the sky. While I revise crime rates increase.
A lone wolf, last of her pack, becomes a photograph
while I rewrite her as an Unknown Grave
and research antidotes for “was.” This poem
could go on, but surely by now you’ve got the point.
2 rhinos, both women, neither pregnant, the last
of their species, are staring at Mt. Kenya,
having the only conversation worth having now.

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Peter Herring is a poet and fiction writer living on a small farm near Port Townsend, WA. He has long covid and is currently writing a novel length series of linked flash fiction stories about people with covid, long covid and their caretakers, working title, Love, Covid. Recently, a long story, “Night Driving,” was published by Twelve Winters.