print previewback KATE GASKIN
Delta, Echo, Alpha, Romeo
January, Omaha splitting
open like a wound, like a moan
hard with teeth, back when
we spoke on the phone delta, echo,
alpha, romeo all the tiny wicks
of dread curling their small
fires deep into my heart.
In Al Udeid, you said, the wind
in the sand was not quite
a lament, nor did your plane
mean certain death. Tell me,
then, how you loaded
the bombs, how you parted
the air, how the ocean divides
breath between us. In Doha
you followed the sun
to the Gulf. Not once have I
believed we’ll be spared. 
Delta, Echo, Alpha, Romeo
Operations Suite
Poem in Which My Husband Deploys and Our
Baby and I Move Back in with My Parents