Zeli M. Miceli is a recent graduate from the MFA program in Creative Writing and Literary Translation at Queens College. Their work in drama has been staged at Dixon Place and The SoHo Playhouse. Their other literary work has appeared in Foglifter Press and QC Voices. Zeli teaches at Queens College and lives in New York City.
Sunset Beaming Into Elementary School
from the windows of buildings across the street:
millenium sun, bronze, blinding if you aren’t
careful. I say bye to the kind eyed man
picking up his son and see the boy rotate
his head back toward me, prismed almost
as they walk away, together, through the threshold
of post elementary school hours. I cannot
discern his sudden expression, but in that moment I am
that child; a torrent of seconds, looking into memory,
backwardly wanting for some degree of orange here.
The child’s face could be aghast—shuttered pivot to the shadow
engulfing his. Or, his face is Heaven orient; luminescent and homeward.
Sunshine pours down on sons who shutter to pronounce their own names.
Me with the attendance roster, and check marks slashing
at the names of children who stride home, copper faced,
in the hands of fathers. Or, unfathered; unclasped
by anyone. It could almost be morning, but isn’t.
Engraved in this boys crew cut is a glistening star
and I almost miss it because every damn day, I notice it
soaring
just at the moment they exit.
