Comets: Relationships that Wander          

by Annie Klier Newcomer
                                               

She had an arrangement with God:
She’d make the introductions.
He’d keep us safe. She placed our hands

over, then pushed our fingers on
the cold rosary beads, helping us keep track
of our prayers. She reminded us

to round up our sins each week,
even searched for them with us between
the floorboards, then dropped us off at the Church

to deposit into the Confessional. This way we could
never stray, she reasoned, we’d know our way home,
always an orderly and fail-safe orbit to her house

and to Heavenly Salvation. She hadn’t counted
on comets. Didn’t figure they were there
at the beginning too. Hadn’t imagined her children’s

choices becoming paths for maverick objects wandering
through the universe: The Stargrazers that misjudged
the distance from the eternal Bright, obliterated. Comet

Hyakutake’s 14,000 year-interval before another earth viewing,
Halley’s short-term trajectory, still a 75 year wait,
and the Intergalactic that escaped entirely, never to return.


* * * * *

The poem "Comets: Relationships that Wander" won an honorable mention place in the publication Studio (Australia) and was first published there. It is the title poem of Annie Klier Newcomer's new poetry collection Comets: Relationships that Wander (Finishing Line Press, February 25, 2022).

Annie Klier Newcomer teaches poetry classes at Turning Point, a Center for Hope & Healing in Kansas City, Kansas. She also helps coach chess for After-School Programs in mid-town KC. Annie writes as a way to connect and to add value to her life. Presently she is an editor for Flapper Press Poetry Café and a member of the Key West Cigar Factory Poetry Group.