After This, Our Exile

After This, Our Exile

Luke Andrews

It’s got so that it’s all just bloody fiction,
The holly-jolly stuff.  For me it’s dread.
The joy that was and ought to be has said
So long before the end-of-month eviction.

It’s not just melancholy predilection.
It’s not just raging hormones in my head.
No; it’s a shameless fraud.  I’ve been misled.
The Christmas season’s full of crucifixion.

So then, out walking, waiting to be banished
From December rest, back to the drudging slog,
I spot a moving van, and through the fog
I see the couple.  Nice kids.  Made a mistake.
Lost their paradise and now they’ll vanish
Until their son can step on some damned snake.

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Luke Andrews
Poet & Lawyer

Luke Andrews is a trial lawyer and writer based in Atlanta, Georgia

Photography by Jessica Pineda