What Is
Suffering, Seneca tells us, happens on a loop
in hours we imagine. We imagine a blood red sun,
a beast rising from the sea, a creature we created
to punish us our sins of our past, to punish ourselves
on a regular rotation of what we think we deserve.
The kids outside, climbing the trunk of our tallest
tree, triumphant in mounting the lowest of its arms,
smiling in the last pink light shafts of early winter.
My hound asleep belly up, her leg kicking a little,
dreaming of the chase. What is requires no chase.
There are stores of soup in our cupboards, coffee
percolating in the kitchen, pictures of lost loved ones
in the ages where what I imagined was never losing
anyone or anything, their happy eyes knowing then,
posing for a portrait, how easy we miss what is.
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J.D. Isip’s collections include Reluctant Prophets (Moon Tide Press, 2025), Kissing the Wound (Moon Tide Press, 2023), and Pocketing Feathers (Sadie Girl Press, 2015). J.D. teaches in South Texas where he lives with his dogs, Ivy and Bucky.