​Robert E Heald

the Clark's Nutcracker,
for which the Grand Canyon
is a habitat, can remember
the exact location of up
to 30,000 pine nuts. Your
memory is like this, but often
I wish you could forget the
mistakes I've made, for I
have made so many

when naturally
occurring, forest
fires act as cleansing
agents, fostering
diversity, a richness
of species, and lush
vegetation. Human
prevention of natural
fires is the sole cause
of "wildfires," which
destroy vast swaths
of land irreparably
and apocalyptically

sometimes I want to go
back to these places, in
better times. But there is
so much of the world
still left to see, and so
many miles left to go.
Besides, we were there,
together, and that is
enough

Illuminating
by Robert E. Heald

We eat green apples and tortillas with peanut butter sitting on the rocks at Cape Final, a kind of peace offering between us after the last fight, an hour ago, when I stalked off with the only bottle of water to walk the two miles through pinewoods alone. You stand at the edge of the cliffs, spread your arms wide, and yawp into the blue expanse, startling a flock of birds from beneath you. Some things you do make me so nervous, but you’re doing it to make me laugh, and it works, and I love you for it. We walk together back to the Jeep parked at the trailhead, and you keep saying how much the woods look like someplace from Game of Thrones, like you say whenever there’s tall trees on all sides. On the way out of the park we stop at a Lincoln-log country store. While I pump gas, you buy a refrigerated egg sandwich that makes me gag when you open the packaging, and Fire-Chili Doritos. “Did you know Doritos have bat shit in them?” “Of course, everybody knows that. You ask me that every time I get Doritos.” You make me pull over every few miles so you can take pictures: bison in a field; shattered and blackened pine trunks where wildfire swept through; towers of rock you insist look like faces, though I don’t see them. The South Rim is only ten miles through empty space from where we sat and ate tortillas, but to get to the visible mountains beyond you have to drive two hundred miles around, down from pines through dusty gullied landscapes, red rock and sage. After driving an hour down the wrong highway while the day begins to fade, we eat burgers at Sonic before turning back. The food poisoning will hit me exactly eighteen hours later like the big rigs you careen into the wrong lane to pass, but right now I’m laughing at your joke about the name of this bum-fuck town. Later that night, you think I’m flirting with the check-in girl at the Motel 6 in Flagstaff. We fight, again. I spend a long time in the shower, crying and wondering if it ever ends. It doesn’t, and it won’t, but somehow we fall asleep while Arizona moonlight pours through slatted blinds, and when I wake whimpering from some nameless nightmare, you’re there, you’re right there, and you’re real.

I wanted you to have
something to
remember, something
unbroken, but truth
was always what
mattered most to you,
so I have tried to
leave nothing out

while not actually used
in Doritos, guano, or
bat dung, is highly
sought after by organic
farmers for its fertilizing
properties. But some
species of bats will
starve to death when
regularly disturbed, put
into a panic state during
their resting period

due to the volcanically formed
mountains in which Flagstaff
is located, the city is 2,000 feet
higher than the surrounding
desert. The youngest volcano
is less than 1,000 years old, and
so there is a high likelihood
that volcanic activity will occur
in the near future. It is
impossible to predict when and
where this eruption will occur.

the Japanese art form of Kintsugi consists of repairing broken pottery with a lacquer
mixed with powdered gold. No attempt is made to hide the breakage, and the fault-lines
are literally illuminated. Thus, an object is made more beautiful by having been broken

Born and raised in Atlanta, GA, Robert E. Heald graduated from Colorado College in 2014, and is currently an MFA candidate in the Helen Zell Writer's Program at the University of Michigan. His poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in River Styx, Cleaver Magazine, Reservoir, Assaracus, and others.

​​​Illuminating​by Robert E. Heald

Illuminating
by Robert E. Heald