The Hour
Jennifer MacBain-Stephens
The hour refuses to pose for the camera.
The hour was drenched by a Garland of Roses.
The hour was prepping to stud.
The jockey sits with his legs crossed,
drinks a cup of tea. The tea
grows cold too quickly.
(It whinnies at this, the hour.)
The hour is in the stable
with a stop watch
strapped to its back,
prepping for the most exciting two minutes in sports.
It is really the best place for the hour,
it doesn’t have personal belongings.
Keeping up with the cleaning
was the end of the hour.
All the suitors are women.
They have the lightest caresses the
hour ever felt. The hour
barely feels its second hand.
The hour nibbles an apple core
from each gloved palm.
This makes the hour’s day.
The hour is a stallion at day,
a colt by night.
Sometimes a sun dial or a goat stirs up drama.
The hour couldn’t ask for a better
time honored tradition really.
It’s the memories, though, that get
to the hour.
It can’t make them fast enough.
Jennifer MacBain-Stephens went to NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and currently lives in the DC area with her family. She is the author of six chapbooks. Recent ones are forthcoming from Dancing Girl Press, Crisis Chronicles Press and Shirt Pocket Press. Her first full-length poetry collection is forthcoming from Lucky Bastard Press. Recent work can be seen / is forthcoming at, Pretty Owl Poetry, Yes, Poetry, Gargoyle, Jet Fuel Review, glitterMOB, Pith, So to Speak, Apple Valley Review, Otis Nebula, Freezeray, Entropy, Right Hand Pointing, and decomP. Jennifer MacBain-Stephens is online at jennifermacbainstephens.wordpress.com.
