One Sentence Poems

Steve Klepetar Reading on the Beach I start out trying to read on the beach, sun glaring off the page, but it’s so hard to concentrate with you rising before me, eyes burning, hair tangled and wild in summer sun, book hissing to steam in my hand as you pull me out to sea, sky […]

Steve Klepetar On the Platform The train was late, so we stood on the platform staring down the track into darkness, and my father said “Don’t wish your life away,” said it with a slight smile, a little joke, a little wisdom I could have for free as I walked down to the far end […]

Steve Klepetar From the Undertow A woman pulls herself from the undertow, half blinded by the sun, for she has struggled a long time against this kind of drowning, learned to float, respect the waves without enmity or fear, learned to empty herself when ocean rumbles beneath a vacant sky, learned to trust her hands […]

Steve Klepetar Good Lovin’ A man wakes up after getting bumped on the head, discovers he’s the only person on earth who remembers the Young Rascals, belts out “Good Lovin’” (which sounded like “Dude-A-Love” on the record which doesn’t exist in this alternate world), becomes a megastar, gets elected president, abuses his power by signing […]

Steve Klepetar To the Reddened Earth My body fell away and I was glass and air, a handful of sand tossed against the window, then streaming down in rainbow patterns to the reddened earth. Steve Klepetar‘s three-year-old granddaughter looked out the big window at the back of his house and said “I love your view.” […]

Steve Klepetar Before Bed Bleary-eyed at nine o’clock, I struggle to stay awake, book slipping from my hand as I climb out of myself, wander in moonless dark toward the pond, where a million frogs break their throats in velvet air. Steve Klepetar‘s three-year-old granddaughter looked out the big window at the back of his […]

Steve Klepetar Mirror This is not a mirror, it’s not a lake turned on its axis, it’s not the sky drained of color on a winter’s day, but a door to a thousand lakes, each one spread out beneath a ring of pines, a door to the sky you can open to race at the […]

Steve Klepetar Excuse Me But one thing you’ll never hear from a cat is ‘Excuse me.’ Nor Einstein’s famous theorem. Jane Hirshfield No, but if it could move at something approaching the speed of light, you might see a red glow in August, or green as it fell to the bottom of some extraterrestrial sea, […]