I forgot to bring
the bags from home
(again) the cashier placed the
woven polypropylene bag of grapefruit
into a plastic bag
large enough to hold a
woven polypropylene bag of grapefruit
large enough to hold a rainstorm
large enough to hold forty inches of rain
my white dodge neon bumping along
and the bare skin of my knees
against the steering wheel
I glance at the passenger seat
my compact disc player skipping
into a cassette tape adapter
a watery music
             yesterday’s sunshine
kissing the rain today
at home I take the bag
out of its bag (again)
and outside it is still raining
as I divide a grapefruit
and count how many miles
             one, two, three, four,
until lightning
             five, six, seven,                ,
strikes again

PAUL CUNNINGHAM is from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. From the Swedish, he has translated Words (OOMPH Press, 2019) by Helena Österlund, and The Night’s Belly (Toad Press, 2016) and Automanias (Goodmorning Menagerie, 2016) by Sara Tuss Efirk. His latest poetry chapbook, The Inmost, is forthcoming in 2020. He is a PhD candidate at the University of Georgia and he holds an MFA from the University of Notre Dame.

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