Ryan Collins

Turn the corner & someone appears

out of the clap

of twilight leaking between homes.

Someone in the shape of a blind spot,

a Rorschach of a person.

Tell the puddles what you see,

what leaks out of your head

& home into what mirror.

​

The “getting somewhere” too often sees

you driving blind, having to drive

thru ink blots in the shapes

of people, like puddles—

​

Flat-seeming, but like homes & potholes filled w/ water,

they are deeper than an inland sea.

Ryan Collins is the author of A New American Field Guide & Song Book and several chapbooks. Recently he was a finalist in the Omnidawn Poetry Chapbook Contest, the DIAGRAM/New Michigan Press Chapbook Contest, the Midwest Chapbook Contest, and the Conduit/Minds on Fire Open Book Prize. His poems have appeared in Apartment, Black Clock, Ninth Letter, Sink Review, and many other places. He hosts the SPECTRA Reading Series in Rock Island, IL, where he lives.