New Year’s Eve

POETRY
Written By James Kelly Quigley

By James Kelly Quigley

On the white lane of my heart  
I can see for miles, leagues
in every direction, even down. 
No one is coming to save me. 
So tonight I open the blinds 
to face the slow, bright music. 
To think it was me 
who'd been singing all this time, 
confusing the sex-starved birds. 
This place is swollen with light, 
cock-eyed, punch-drunk, 
and its ears are cauliflowers.   
Loneliness costs gobs of money 
but the pink champagne is gratis. 
And it feels somehow overdue. 

James Kelly Quigley

James Kelly Quigley’s poetry has received Pushcart Prize and Best New Poets nominations. Recent work has been published or is forthcoming in The Los Angeles Review, New York Quarterly, Denver Quarterly, Narrative, SLICE, The American Journal of Poetry, THE BOILER, Salt Hill, and other places. He received both a BA and an MFA from New York University, where he taught undergraduate creative writing and was an editor of Washington Square Review. James was born and raised in New York. He works as a freelance writer in Brooklyn.

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A Bunch of Beeps and Lights