Justin Carter

Resemblances

What I thought was the sky turned out
to be just a cloud shaped
like the sky. Sometimes objects appear
& other times, it’s a knock-off.
My friend buys a jersey
off some discount website
& it says Houston Rcokets on it,
which is close, sure, but
it’s not exactly what he was looking for,
like how yesterday I ordered
the same nachos I did last week
but something was changed—more chips
& less beer cheese, more cotija
but nary a pickled onion to be found,
a thing that resembled what I expected
but with some key differences.
Lately, I’ve been thinking about loss—
not death, just loss. People like
to use those as synonyms. Really,
people like to use a lot of things
as synonyms because precision is tough—
Sabrina Ionescu makes less than half
her threes & we call it greatness.

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Justin Carter is the author of Brazos (Belle Point Press, 2024). His poems have appeared in Bat City Review, DIAGRAM, Sonora Review, and other spaces. Originally from the Texas Gulf Coast, Justin currently lives in Iowa and works as a sports writer and editor.