James Coal Jackson
My boss asks when I get sinus
headaches, what do I take?
I say I usually let myself
suffer. Today, Servant Fire
Protection tests the alarms.
Warned but not prepared,
I slide my glass door shut.
When I text you the stress
it puts me through, you
respond with a boxing
idiom: you’re down for
the count– submerged
in work you chose
yourself.
‡‡
JAMES COAL JACKSON is a Filipino-American poet working in film production. His latest chapbook is A God You Believed In (Pinhole Poetry, 2023). Recent poems are in The River, Mangrove Review, and Packingtown Review. He edits The Mantle Poetry from Nashville, Tennessee. www. jamescroaljackson.com.
Union Spring Literary Review 