WOOL-GATHERING
by KAREEM TAYYAR
Lately I have begun
counting sheep in the daytime.
It’s nice,
especially on an afternoon
like this one,
bumper-to-bumper
on a freeway that feels thousands
of miles from any pasture.
The sheep all seem to understand.
They gather around me as I offer
my recitations,
& listen with the patience of saints.
Later we move deeper into
the hills together.
I let them lead.
They know where the river is,
& how much further before we arrive
at the Temple of Stars.
— from Issue 4
KAREEM TAYYAR’s most recent book, The Prince of Orange County (Pelekinesis, 2018), was a finalist for an Independent Book Award, and his poetry and fiction has been published in a wide variety of journals, including Alaska Quarterly Review, Brilliant Corners, The Santa Monica Review, and The Writer’s Almanac. He holds a Ph.D. in English from U.C. Riverside, and he’s a recipient of a 2019 Wurlitzer Poetry Fellowship.