Daydreams, fervent and vivid of
desolation, beauty, delight.
How heavily my body
is anchored, how listless
my shadow passes over cold, famished streets.
I am a gloomed man, with the rapid-
fire neurons of a lunatic, resolved
to set sail to reach the arc of eternal light.
If I fail, Star-filled sky
when I fail, oceans of ice
(see how my hope is already changing, the slow passage of time
how my spirit wicks low), the folly of this venture
may the universe unchain your fate from mine.
How strangely our souls
are built, how insensible
even our breath,
how much sweeter when
childhood hearts resembled roses in mother’s garden
plucked from dark-leaved brambles
and oh, how we have lost
everything to monstrosity.

Kristin Fullerton resides in upstate New York with bucolic views of the Helderberg Escarpment from her backyard. She is a proud alumna of both Elmira College and University at Albany. Previous work has appeared in Poetry Hall, Panoplyzine, and The Maine Review.
