Paul Dickey


Driving Home, West Out of Wichita

You are introduced to darkness 
much like an old love concealing 
a desperate future; a new lover, 
a desperate past. Black lines
cut through dusk, orange farms, 
and call themselves trees.

In fifty miles, this sky 
will disappear, deposit you. 
The shapes of Western Kansas 
will become 'houses, anything, 
cars. Two lights follow you; 
two lights rush to greet you.



For Ms Chiu

Run to keep balance; 
a kite in a hard wind. 
As you must, go.
by the name of Grace.

Or in the lounge,
a giggle box playing cards
with girls hands move
rivers over a harp;

compose English words
I cannot argue with.
Your namesake in prayer lines 
stands among broken knees.

The hymn stops. The pianist 
continues to play: There is 
a song I remember. I. do not
know if she will play it.



They Ask For It

I just wanted to say
it’s funny you would mention it
I always know
I always wanted to say:

Our chalk
faces hold
blue winter
in thin eyes.

There, it is said
please don’t laugh 
I promise
I’ll never mention it again 

Paul Dickey's new book Anti-Realism in Shadows at Suppertime, came out in the last few months of last year. His poetry and flash have appeared in Plume, Verse Daily, Sentence: A Journal of Prose Poetics, Southern Poetry Review, Potomac Review, Pleaides, 32Poems, Bellevue Literary Review, and Crab Orchard Review, among other online and print publications.

More info is available at the author's new website: https://pauldickey9.wix.com/paul-dickey

 
 

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