the wound of the story

JB Mulligan


The tale always begins sometime
after the beginning. The narrator
is there, or is watching there,
and everything that is to come
is already present: the blossom
waits to spread its wings of color
from the bud’s hot fist. The teller
merely lets the story bloom.
Sometimes there is, at the end,
triumph — or loss — often both.
But there is always the wound
of being, and that curious sound
as much like a leak as like a breath,
at first sight of what stretches out beyond.

JB Mulligan has had over 500 poems and 50 pieces of prose published over the last 30+ years.