Omen

No one was watching when the sky fell

unseen mind still mired in distant fires

inaugural sins the wind’s candor screeching

tires the only answer

Affairs usually end where they began

paradigms shifting paradoxes jammed

your face’s familiar as my mom’s name

or the taste of my own blood the doves

got used to the chains

Notes:

The ephemerality of living in an empty city. My hope was to find myself here, inundated with
passing remarks and forgotten questions. Streetlights are mocking in their ephemerality. Most
things catch fire here. Riots slowly.

J.L. Moultrie is a native Detroiter and multi-genre writer who communicates his craft through words. He fell in love with literature after encountering James Baldwin, Hart Crane and many others. He considers himself a modern, abstract expressionist.