It’s how I found myself
drunk and high-centered in the sand, stars
fading, the town out cold, a phosphorescent
pre-dawn light dizzy around me.
David J.S. Pickering is a native Oregonian, having grown up and lived much of his life in the working-class culture of the North Oregon Coast. His work can be found (or is forthcoming) in a variety of journals, including Tar River Poetry, Reed Magazine, Fireweed, Mantis, Lips, Gertrude, and Haunted Waters Press. David is retired after a 30-year career in human resources management. He and his husband, Stephen, live in Hillsboro, Oregon.
David has also been a lead performer in a musical dinner theater, a member of a counterculture theater group, a tenor in a vocal jazz octet, and a choral singer in various choirs.
David dislikes karaoke, weak coffee, dithering, and cheap sentiment. He likes people but finds social media exhausting.
The world will ask you who you are, and if you don’t know, the world will tell you.
-Dr. Carl. Jung