by stalking various tomorrows
as if they are a pack of wolves
I will wear one of them like a cloak
slip into its skin once it is mine

I will push my arm into the sleeve
of its front paw and pull the zipper
up the steaming center of its torso
the scraping of its ribs maddening

each twitch of the second hand
a steel jaw I have set in the snow
a baneful legend becomes me
staring yellow lenses of a beast

home withering to a forest darkened
and I am still the destiny devourer
my curving fangs gnaw on dreams
sacrificing a leg if necessary

this disguise turns its back on me
footprints trailing into the unknown
the howl of wind over the river
the sheen of mist around the moon

Jim Heston's poetry has been published by Sidereality, Alba, The Banyan Review, The Muse Apprentice Guild, and Coffee Press Journal in 2003. Snow Monkey, Star*Line, Baylor Magazine, and Mobius will be printing more of his poems soon. Currently, he edits a literary magazine called The Growl at Carver Academy where he has been teaching writing since 1996. He was also the editor-in-chief of The Phoenix literary magazine of Baylor University from 1992-94.