Second Coming No. 139 — June 7, 2025
A poem-a-day protest against the threat posed to our democracy by the current occupant of the White House and his regime
Nan Wigington
Ordinary Morning
What I remember
colludes with
what I forget.
It happened last night,
tomorrow morning,
in the white of winter,
the sweat of summer.
The war had begun,
it was undone.
The moon limped behind the junipers.
The sun heaved its heavy heart across the horizon.
Everyone watched. No one saw.
You ran, slipped—
on a wet leaf, a streak of blood, snow.
I saw their guns, luminescent,
their car, their tank beside you,
their soldiers, ours—
how they just took you.
In my dreams, you come back.
It is us again, ordinary, you at the table,
me making breakfast, onions and eggs, garlic and toast,
but I wake, and you’re still gone.
My heart is a chaos—
This their greatest victory.
Nan Wigington‘s poems and flash fiction have appeared in Alternative Milk Magazine, Idle Ink, Tiny Molecules, Molotov Cocktail, The Ekphrastic Review and other journals. She lives in a large retirement community on the eastern edge of Denver.
Indolent Books and editor Michael Broder are back with another poem-a-day series as a creative response to the threat posed to our democracy by the current occupant of the White House. The plan is to continue for all 1460 days of the 47th American presidency.
Find out how to submit poems or flash prose pieces to Second Coming.
If you like Second Coming and you want to support it, consider making a donation to Indolent Arts, the 501(c)(3) nonprofit fiscal sponsor of Indolent Books.
Second Coming is a section of Beachcomber Mike. To unsubscribe from a section:
1. Navigate to your account Settings page via www.substack.com/settingsand click on the publication you want to make changes to.
2. Slide the toggle next to each section you'd like to stop receiving emails or app notifications from. A gray toggle indicates that notifications will be off for that section.
 | A guest post by
|