Coda

I never liked musical chairs.
It always seemed so random
and, in a way, unkind,
leaving the unlucky one behind.
My niece, a nurse,
was gone in April.
My friend John Simone
who played lead in our
junior high band
and leapt off garage roofs,
died last month.
And that seraph Nicky,
who saved my life once
lies alone and breathless.
I pray for where he’ll be
when the music stops.

*

Alec Solomita is a writer, editor, and artist working in the Boston area. His fiction has appeared in The Mississippi Review, Southwest Review, Peacock, and elsewhere. He’s published poetry in Eclectica, Literary Orphans, 3 Elements Review, Silver Birch Press, The Galway Review, Poetica Review, and many other venues. His poetry chapbook, Do Not Forsake Me (Finishing Line Press), came out in 2017. His photographs and drawings have appeared in The Adirondack Review, The Young Ravens Literary Review, Anti-heroin Chic, Fumble, Fatal Flaw Literary Review, and elsewhere.