By Jessica Pierce

And he admires that probability. It’s far more likely
than the chance of us being here as who we are; someone calculated that
as about 400 trillion to one. He admires this, too, and how the sun

sits on our shoulders right now. Under the eaves of that sturdy-as-hell roof,
the common ariel hornet tucked her nest for the summer.
I was about to describe the season as brief,

but that is only how my stuttering synapses
process time. So, I assure myself that my father will live damn close
to forever, with a quick sidestep to knock on the closest tree and shush

any wisp of a god still hovering nearby. The bit of sun moves,
so we move. Dolichovespula arenaria probably notes
where our ungainly grounded bodies take up space

and keeps a safe distance, her stinger at the ready but sheathed
as long as we don’t keep her from the lacewings and spiders
she seeks for her still-soft larvae. The larvae trust her strong mandibles

will bring back what they need, and she trusts
the secreted sugar they offer back when they’re full,
a nectar of thanks thanks for the sisterhood, a chance

for another summer day. Again, the sun shifts. And there’s so much
light striking my ever-blinking eyes that it’s hard to bear
witness to much beyond my warm shoulders, beyond the idea

of my father next to me, beyond the communion of chance.

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Jessica Pierce has poems in magazines including Bellingham Review, JMWW, Tar River Poetry, Euphony, Painted Bride Quarterly, and Northwest Review. Nimrod International Journal selected her as a finalist for the 2020 and 2021 Pablo Neruda Prize for Poetry. She was a finalist in CALYC Journal’s 2020 Lois Cranston Memorial Poetry Prize, New Ohio Review’s 2019 NORward Prize for Poetry, and the 2019 MVICW Poetry Contest. She was also the recipient of a 2019 MVICW Poet Fellowship. Her debut collection, Consider the Body, Winged, was published in 2021 by First Matter Press. She is also a Pushcart Prize and Best New Poets nominee.