The Hunting Trip

Presley Pendergrass


I found myself, pen in hand, ready to kill.

I pursued you who walked about namelessly plain,

and leapt across the earth’s open gill,

landing without a sign or sound of pain.


I wrote myself a gun which trembled in my grip.

Among the trees I knelt beneath a love I could not hold.

One eye open wide, burned blind by the sun’s raw whip.

The other, shut purple, held a perspective untold.


I craved the vast uncertainty of someone new

but feared your curls, entwined—a quiet snare.

Your fingers locked with mine, a heat which grew;

A love that tightens into a red-faced prayer.


Is my purpose—my skin, my flesh, my bone?

Is love confined to what a person shows?

Do my thoughts mean nothing when I am alone?

Must I kill you here just so my love grows?


Would I still love the way your eyes align,

if I could see myself through their debris?

I sit a hunter crouched behind the optic line,

who watches you, watching me.


And as my stupid love for you upheaves

a hollow echo bounces underneath my Sunday best.

The gray birds ascend beyond the leaves,

the bullet, now a part of me, held tightly in my chest.