J.D. Smith


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This Too Be Verse

after Larkin

I got out early, like you said,
And murdered my posterity.
Now that I’ve made my barren bed
My heart should flutter light and free.

It aches, instead, with time to brood
On rising seas, on species lost,
On threats of war and how we’re screwed
By greed that doesn’t count its cost.

Pain’s pending claims won’t be denied,
As I imagine you knew, Phil.
With or without kids by your side
Man’s misery can deepen still.


Mystery, Explained

A corpse turns up, as corpses will,
Of one you wouldn’t think to kill,
A maiden aunt, a gentle don,
A vicar or a vicar’s swan.
Although the deed has left no clue,
Somebody must have done it. (Who?)
Our hero—woman, man or cat—
Is on the case in seconds flat
To sift through wills and alibis
And catch the culprit up in lies
Dismantled in a drawing room
Among the suspects, most of whom
Would figure in more likely theories.
Please buy the next book in this series.

J.D. Smith‘s latest poetry collection, The Killing Tree, includes poems first published in Light. His other books include the poetry collections Labor Day at Venice Beach (2012) and Settling for Beauty (2005), the humor collection Notes of a Tourist on Planet Earth (2013), the essay collection Dowsing and Science (2011), and the children’s picture book The Best Mariachi in the World. He was awarded a Fellowship in Poetry from the National Endowment for the Arts in 2007. In addition to Light, his individual poems have appeared in The Able Muse, The Bark, The Formalist, and Measure.