On a summer evening,
unremarkable
in its casual radiance
of which we are
not yet aware,
security cameras
in the parking garage,
bank, coffee shop,
& liquor store
record our
dinner party
meandering
to our parked cars
as we stroll
through an
intersection where,
six hours later,
a crime scene
blooms when
a college girl
walks in our wake,
turns the same corner,
& vanishes
without leaving
so much as
a strand
of her blond hair.
Our evening,
the next morning,
is reframed
through a lens
of danger.
Cruising the block
for what looked like
a parking spot,
that old red
Chevrolet pickup truck
was maybe a predator
from a distance circling
us. At the restaurant,
the lanky gentleman
who held the door
could have been
sizing us up,
calculating
terrible possibilities.
Like a calm, reflective
lake mirroring
a clear blue sky
as a dragonfly
skims the surface
after a drowning,
the world
swallowed her
without a ripple
in the morning light.
Joseph Kerschbaum’s most recent publications include Midnight Sunrise (Main Street Rag Press, 2024) and Mirror Box (Main St Rag Press, 2020). His recent work has appeared in Reunion: The Dallas Review, Hamilton Stone Review, and The Inflectionist Review. Joseph lives in Bloomington, Indiana with his family.