Tom Daley
For the Aircraft Carriers
Static is the only steadfast thing.
How can I see you
if you come in short? The mosquito’s
quarrel never foreshortens the kamikaze
dawn. Out of fuel, fuming.
The message is best delivered
on a ding and a tear. Takeoffs
are always harder
than forgetting. Swabbing
is only the preliminary
to a cure. Square your shoulders,
sailor—the stars are about to scrawl.
Tom Daley is the author of House You Cannot Reach—Poems in the Voice of My Mother and Other Poems (FutureCycle Press, 2015). His poetry has appeared in Harvard Review, Massachusetts Review, 32 Poems, Fence, Denver Quarterly, Crazyhorse, Barrow Street, Prairie Schooner, Witness, Poetry Ireland Review, and other journals, as well as in the anthologies Hacks: Ten Years on Grub Street (Random House, 2007); Poets for Haiti (Yileen Press, 2010); The Body Electric (CreateSpace, 2013); and Luminous Echoes (Into the Void, 2017). He leads writing workshops in the Boston area and online for poets and writers working in creative prose.
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