Zebulon Huset


Like everything was part of some long story you forgot all the words to but one

Your clothes,                               			well, not too unhipster,
but what's hipper                               		than not being tied down
                                             			to a permanent place of residence?

Attire that said                               		my favorite band hasn't even 
met yet,                                       			and they've already broken up. 
                                             			And I lost my job over the heartbreak. 

And now I spend my days chanting a word I coined 
               	as the antithesis of the band’s newly-taboo name.
More than a word,                          		a hymn slurred into song.

A guttural aria fit for a Jabberwocky parade,
               	each revolution of syllables brought new stresses.

The little walking green man blinks                		and we leave
you behind with your mantra.                               		C'est la vie.

A man sells corn.                                		Fresh strawberries and avocado.
               	A breeze lifts hair of pedestrians synchronously.

                              		A compressed hand of tree blooms white flowers
which redact just the right amount of blue from the sky.



While it's not a contest or a symptom we shouldn't obsess

The popular otters cling together
tight as a murder of crows at a funeral. 
Skipping seashells on the rising tide—
thighs tight, scapulas protruding. 

It's strange, that multiple media
fictions imagined an attack like 9-11
yet none predicted shoeless airports,
Teddy Ruxpin, smart phones, Twitter. 

Beautiful butter sculptures shrink
under the hot sun. I am no ice block.
The action star quips again in PG-13,
a special language created for currency. 

A forlorn spider carapace curled up
like a crimped wire head massager. 
Octopuses congregating in October
for the annual devil's night party. 

Yesterday is a Japanese game show
you're always too inflexible to win. 
My poem’s hat randomized—ask Ouija—
remind me exactly who I am.



Not Walking in Circles but Gaining Momentum

You can't fish for snails 
                              		lacking apt bait.
But—                              			salty dogs tell no tales.

This isn't a race 	it’s erosion.
                              		We know icebergs by name,
	galaxies by number—	                              		call me.

I reach out spiral arms
                              		fighting more than gravity
                                             			like a riptide-bound octopoda.

Serendipity whips us
                              		and around the globe
tethered to a               	   pulsing               	  molten                	core. 

I'd always hated centrifuges,
                              		so they sold it as a gyre,
                                                            				and who can hate a gyre?




Zebulon Huset is a teacher, writer and photographer living in San Diego. He won the Gulf Stream 
2020 Summer Poetry Contest and his writing has appeared in Otoliths, Meridian, The Southern Review, 
Fence, Atlanta Review & Texas Review among others. He publishes the writing blog Notebooking Daily, 
edits the journals Coastal Shelf and Sparked, and recommends literary journals at TheSubmissionWizard.com.
 
 

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