Current Issue: Spring/Summer 2011

Jennifer in Space: Brief Notes on Helio-Galactic Lullabies 
Ash Bowen

Song after song, it’s become obvious

the sun is not the lone alto
astronomers once believed

but a chorus of atoms breaking
into lullabies.
                              Out there our planets

have been lulled and are falling fast
              asleep. Even our most confident

astronauts aren’t certain of what to expect
               should Earth fail to open

its eyes in time to catch them
                                                            at splashdown.

But Jen, little has changed on Earth
               for us. You still keep to your own

orbit at the end of the hall, sending
                                                          your wishes

to disinterested stars. Should you find
              in your slumber that you’re among those

celestial bodies, sleepwalking—
               that suddenly you’re Jenny-in-Space,

wombed with a child so round
              its orbit startles you from sleep—

call me. I’ll transmit to you
                             the sweetest lullaby

the Earth has never heard.

 

Ash Bowen’s poems have appeared in New England Review, Crab Orchard Review, Black Warrior Review, Rattle, and elsewhere. He is co-managing editor of Linebreak and co-edited Two Weeks: A Digital Anthology of Contemporary Literature, the world's first e-book-only anthology of contemporary poetry. This marks his second appearance in Pebble Lake Review. His manuscript is making the rounds.