Fresh limbs on the bonfire, sky
overcome with smoke. You’ve been keeping
everything in, your muscle sliding away
from the bone like the last Christmas
you were all together, your father
smothering his grief with supermarket
vodka. The moon drags me back
to the moment, blue light falling
through the night’s grey carbon.
If I reach for you, would anything
change? I think you’re talking
about the elderly neighbour, how
you haven’t seen him for two weeks.
Even in the pauses, I do nothing,
just watch the hem of your dress
flutter in the dying breeze.
John Pring is a poet and author based in the UK, where he is an MFA candidate at Manchester Metropolitan University. He is a 2026 Best of the Net nominee, and has poems published or upcoming in The Comstock Review, Epiphany, Poetics, B O D Y, The Passionfruit Review, Meniscus Literary, The King’s English Society, Humana Obscura, Santa Clara Review, and others.