Cow Skull

A red eyed boy listens to a woman with grey hair
tell a story of watching stars in Missouri.

The woman's eyes have the gravity of black holes.
She cannot blink and stars rush towards them
like hawks stooping.

"Will you grow old?" the boy asks.
"When the hair goes," she says.

Nothing changes.
Pictures remain the same
year after year,

and the cow skull near her bedroom
is the same color it was
four years ago, and right now,
for the moment, the boy's eyes
and the woman's
are exactly the same.

Jean Jones attended St. Andrews Presbyterian College and received his B.A. in English from the University of North Carolina Wilmington. He later went on to receive an M.F.A. degree in creative writing from Bowling Green State University. He has had poems published in Aphelion as well as Horror Zine online.

Find more by Jean Jones in the Author Index.

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