Three Poems by Ivan Peledov

Waiting for a Snowfall

This time of the year

centaurs don’t hide in the grass anymore,

trees are playing an ancient game

using the Sun for a ball,

crows are all for body modification,

their new shapes

allow them to reach the Moon.

Every name seems to be misspelled,

endless fences perplex sky dwellers,

clouds desperately try to listen to mice,

the smells of celestial dictionaries

send them off course.

Laughing Stock

While the police were worried about

vile rituals at the edge of the solar system,

I was stealing trapdoors and manhole covers

here on earth, in my hometown.

Disguised as a pile of quarters and dimes

or a scream of a child caught by a tree,

I failed to call passing clouds by their names.

Animals sent to the void above

must have mocked my cheesy imagination.

Wordless

Few in the kingdom desire the dregs of the future.

Fallen leaves inundate the world

and clog the souls of the prophets.

Guardian angels and other beasts

relentlessly lick the sky and wall calendars

made before walls were invented.

They know the days of creation were mute.

Biography: Ivan Peledov lives in Colorado. His poems have been published in Artifact Nouveau, Unlikely Stories, Sonic Boom, Eunoia Review, and other magazines. He is the author of the book Habits of Totems (Impspired, 2021). He can be found online on Twitter @habitsoftotems or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/ivan.peledov.