- Josh Pearce
Selected Poetry by Josh Pearce

Photo Source: PxHere
Knots
If the universe is
in fact
just made of strings
then we are knots
hung suspended
in spacetime's cat's
cradle
an intersection of thought
and occasionally the hands
of the gods come together
to stretch us out in jacob's
ladders
while we remain
unmoved, unblinking, and unaware,
quite suddenly
the lattice of everything
around us
has changed.
Sirena
mamas always told
sailor sons to stay
away
from loose skirts
to only go diving off
the topsails
for girls who'll look
good
in a mermaid wedding
gown
always just to say
that ursula
and morgana
have parrot-beak
dentata
Hortus Conclusus
She's your angel
bedeviled beside her
Let's be biblical here
she bit her lip and moaned
Better than the girl you don't
is the girl you have known.
She's no angel
be the devil inside her
Let's be biblical here
nip her lips and mons
Better porn was never known
than this song of songs.
Firefly Storm
(fi)
in clouds
of ink-black
beetles
(ref)
water
(ly)
striders
fall
(sto)
to
lightning
bug crash
(rm)
Fortune Teller
Went to the fortune teller
and asked,
is there
somebody
for me?
She put down a card for
my wants and a card for
memories, one for
my thoughts and the hand
on the table was me.
I said, my hand is like
so many hands.
I want a different
fortune. I want
a different
somebody.
But fortune says you can be
unique or you can be
loved, you can't
have it both ways.
After I died the fortune
teller shuffled for millions her
genetic deck of hearts for
millennia her few card
trick combinations of
organs and fluids and dreams
until one of the only so many
possible somebodies in the
universe was the same being
I'd been.
And I looked at
this game
of memory for
a matching
hand.
Josh Pearce has stories and poetry in Analog, Asimov’s, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Cast of Wonders, Clarkesworld, IGMS, and Nature. He currently works at Locus magazine and lives in California with his wife and sons. One time, Ken Jennings signed his chest.
If you are interested in checking out Josh Pearce's website, you can find it here as well as his twitter here.