My Longing Has Reached a Point

In his debut collection, Joshua Fulton combines his spellbinding poetry with illustrations from internationally acclaimed artist Poul Rog.



A Martian Talks About Love



Love is when humans hold their chests together.

They lower their eyes like drawbridges

and let the birds inside them walk out.

They hum into a tunnel that connects their faces.

When they are apart, they write letters

to each other inside themselves, and deliver them

to one another like Christmas presents,

then wrap in a cocoon in front of the talk box.

They walk down riverfronts speaking in violin,

wobbling as if the sidewalk were afloat.

Their hands become yellow butterflies.

Crowds part as they walk down the street.

They go into dim rooms, laugh and collapse

on each other, repeatedly, like broken machines.



The Beach



A father and son loom over a clear tide pool,

while creatures scuttle along the silt

and black weeds sway in the water.

Bleached barnacles wait to cut a slipped foot.

The son shatters his image into concentric circles

and fills the water with a cloud of gray silt.

He pulls out a tiny horseshoe crab and laughs

as it claws for the ground that was beneath it.

On the shore, thousands of adults lay like pods

photosynthesizing with books over their eyes.

A team of children struggle to repair a castle.

Teenagers blast music to drown out the waves.

Another child is off from the rest of the crowd,

kneeling on rocks dripping with purple ink.

A gray storm comes in from sea,

while he desperately smashes oysters, searching for a pearl.