"Driving Across the Texas Panhandle, the Sky Blushed" by Anthony DiPietro

the roads not yet wet—

beside them, cuts in ashen earth,

flat and dark and complicated.

I occupied a point in space

somewhere between sunset, far behind me,

and sky before me, which became

a photo shoot, blue-grey

drapery illuminated, flash after flash.

I thought of home—of him—

knowing he too was between

two invisible horizons: his decision

to pour another drink

and his body’s last

lightning bolt.

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Anthony DiPietro is a gay Rhode Island native who has worked in community-based organizations throughout his career. In 2016, he joined Stony Brook University, where he earned a creative writing MFA, taught college courses, and planned and diversified arts programming. He is now associate director of the Rose Art Museum in Waltham, Massachusetts. A graduate of Brown University with honors in creative writing, his poems and essays have appeared in The Chattahoochee Review, Notre Dame Review, The Southampton Review, Washington Square Review, and others. He has been a finalist with Coal Hill Review, Naugatuck River Review, and The Tishman Review, and has received fellowships from Aspen Summer Words, The Frost Place, and Key West Literary Seminars. His work was anthologized in Pan’s Ex: Queer Sex Poetry (Qommunicate, 2019). His website is AnthonyWriter.com.