Complementary

 

This poem is about purple,

and teal,

and lemon meringue pie—

 

about sage green

and chicken, spatchcocked,

and grilled.

 

This poem is about wrapping myself

in a silk-slick black robe, disappearing into midnight,

being seen.

 

It’s about color—

and taste,

and smell,

and feel,

 

and things that just make sense

when they don’t.

 

Like when

and how quickly

we made ourselves one.

 

How it all could have been undone.

How we could have been

undone.

 

But contrast,

and tang,

and memory touch,

 

and savory savoring—

holding on

when it hurt so much—

 

saved us

from us.

 

 

© 2025 Jennifer Wagner

dVerse oln

 

Van Ghosted

 

They say there’s much you can do with

stale bread.

 

Panzanella, bruschetta, crostini.

Croutons, bread pudding.

 

How like spring,

new and fresh, it goes quickly,

 

and then, the blistering oven

of summer is here.

 

But, how do you salvage a poem, like sunrise,

so fleeting you can never seem to catch it in time?

 

Like manna.

Here and gone.

 

I saw it today, etched into the glass of a window

with an epitaph:

 

Your wings were ready, but my heart was not.

I see how it is. 

 

I glimpsed you briefly, soft-robed phantom,

boarding a train to somewhere else,

 

orphaned, like my last vanished poem,

not a breadcrumb in sight,

 

on into the starry night.

 

 

© 2025 Jennifer Wagner

 

Word Garden Word List

dVerse OLN

 

"Your wings were ready, but my heart was not." - Amelia Hutchins

 

When you just don’t jot it down in time.  Know the feeling?  Maybe it will return, when it, and I, am ready. ;)

 

Wooden Nickels

 

Honest Lee stepped out of a dime western—

wavy brown hair, chestnut mustache,

six-shooter on his thigh.

 

Not anybody’s prairie girl,

I knew which one of us was a lie—

even with his black olive eyes,

 

black as my lil’ ol’ pea pickin’ heart.

 

 

© 2025 Jennifer Wagner

Photo © 2025 Jennifer Wagner

 

dVerse Quadrille:  Honestly