Matthew Caretti

An Open Letter to Jack

old angel midnight
the sacred babble
of a winter stream

At times I have felt our bond. The all-night sessions. The too many lovers. The booze. Then forested meditations and on-the-road amblings. Sometimes, though, I know the lived dissonance. Coffee instead of Benzedrine. A learned abstinence. A letting go and a settling in. A sense of contentedness.

faded wall calendar
in mid-october
the x's stop

I have to look up again the date of your passing. I recall it’s during my birthyear, but after my birthday. So no reincarnation. No continuation of consciousness. Perhaps instead we are unsettled soulmates. Pulled in turns between my Japhy and your Alvah. Some singular strand of collective karma binding us, lifetime after lifetime.

scarred palm lines
this thin candle
lit at both ends

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About the Author

Matthew Caretti began publishing his poems in 2009, though his fascination with Eastern short-form genres began much earlier. In 2017, he garnered the Snapshot Press eChapbook Award for Harvesting Stones. In 2022 published his first collection in print, Africa, Buddha, with Red Moon Press. He lives and teaches high school English in Pago Pago, American Samoa.