When I think of the due date
I recall the perished radishes
of my youth, drowning in
a lake of hosewater,
the goldfish floating
among their flakes of food,
the snake a frozen S
in his glass shelter,
surrounded by crickets
hopping the joy of the pardoned.
I think of all the beings
I’ve killed with excess.
Around me, the fireflies
are starting to signal, unjarred,
and the evening wind expires.
My fear: If I can guide this child
safely through her youth,
will I have lost my own?
Michael J. Galko is a Houston-based scientist and poet. In the past year he has had poems published or accepted at descant, Picaroon, Gargoyle, Frogpond, Gulf Coast, Nassau Review, The Concho River Review, and Riddled with Arrows.
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