The Doubt That Follows Improv Class

James Croal Jackson: The Doubt That Follows Improv Class

The Doubt That Follows Improv Class

by James Croal Jackson

Projection meaning screen is blurry.

I don’t want any part of.

Correct. I ended improv

class inspecting

my anxious habits–

has it been too long?

my demons asked.

I could not

answer honestly. Walked

away and waved

to the prospective

attention of no one.

Still, when clouds

are classically beautiful

I recall the simple mistakes.

No one counts

their turns, no one

passes their

inhibitions.

I scan the sky

for a piece of absolution.

Such indelicate pertinence,

this honest-to-however-many-

times I treat myself

like a stray without looking

away.

James Croal Jackson is a Filipino-American poet who works in film production. His latest chapbooks are A God You Believed In (Pinhole Poetry, 2023) and Count Seeds With Me (Ethel Zine & Micro-Press, 2022). Recent poems are in Beltway Poetry Quarterly, Little Patuxent Review, and The Round. He edits The Mantle Poetry from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. (jamescroaljackson.com)

KJ Hannah Greenberg is eclectic. She’s played oboe, participated in martial arts, learned basket weaving, and studied Middle Eastern dancing. What’s more, she’s a certified herbalist, and an AP College Board-authorized teacher of calculus.

Her creative efforts have been nominated once for The Best of the Net in poetry, once for The Best of the Net in art, three times for the Pushcart Prize in Literature for poetry, once for the Pushcart Prize in Literature for fiction, once for the Million Writers Award for fiction, and once for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay. To boot, Hannah’s had more than forty-five books published and has served as an editor for several literary journals.

Check out her latest short fiction collection, An Orbit of Chairs:

https://www.amazon.com/Orbit-Chairs-KJ-Hannah-Greenberg/dp/B0CWMMM73T

Within its pages are two tales originally published at Yellow Mama: "Alive Another Day" and "Light Notes."