Whiteheads

a new poem by Alex Stolis

Whiteheads

It's 16 below zero. The shore belongs to us alone, 
windchill pushes it down to minus 36. Keeps pikers 
away and the eagles don’t seem to mind. 
I count 22 whiteheads in one tree. 

Steve's beard is Santa white. Locking his rig on 
the monopod, he tells his March on Washington story.
Smoking weed on the bus ride from Minneapolis, 
arms linked, chanting No More War— 

crushing on a blonde hippie chick from Ohio. Took her 
on her first acid trip. The whiteheads swoop-dive into 
open water, the adolescents circle again and I should 
be shooting but my arm’s draped over my camera. 

Steve says it took him years to learn to capture birds 
in flight—still doesn’t have it down. He sights through
his viewfinder. It was called the summer of love. 
There was a lot of hate but I’d go back again in a second. 

Our breath is thick fog. The rolling clicks of our shutters 
track the baldie flying his prize to the far tree, a quiet 
splash as a juvie loses grip on his fish—
You would’ve loved that hippie girl.  

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Alex Stolis has had poems published in numerous journals. His chapbook, Postcards from the Knife-Thrower’s Wife, was released by Louisiana Literature Press in 2024, RIP Winston Smith from Alien Buddha Press 2024, and The Hum of Geometry; The Music of Spheres, 2024 by Bottlecap Press. He lives in Hudson Valley New York with his partner, poet Catherine Arra.