George Longenecker
poet, professor of English and history, President of the Poetry Society of Vermont; his poetry has been published in the Atlanta Review, Haight Ashbury Literary Journal, Isthmus, The Main Street Rag, Paterson Review, Poetry Quarterly, Saranac Review, Whale Road Review, War, Literature & the Arts, and others
Star Route
She lived on the Star Route,
Bliss Pond Road,
her dented rural mailbox
one of two on the corner by a sugar maple.
Let me kiss you, she said.
I missed my turn and drove
all the way to Libra; November stars
flared between black branches.
Somewhere between Bliss Pond and Orion,
I turned and followed the right road home.
Let me kiss you, she said,
and I stayed longer.
Some nights we still spread
our wings and fly west
past Orion, wings tip to tip,
Libra to Pisces, along the Star Route,
up over the Pleiades,
blue star dust sparks in her eyes—
Let me kiss you, she says
and we swoop so low over the pond
that our feathers touch stars in the water.
© George Longenecker, published in Atlanta Review 2010 and in Star Route (Main Street Rag Publishing) 2018