Melissa Joplin Higley

Melissa Joplin Higley is the author of First Father (Bottlecap Press). Her poems appear in B_O_D_Y, Feral, Rogue Agent, Sleet Magazine, Whale Road Review, Writer’s Digest, and elsewhere. Melissa holds an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College, co-facilitates the Poetry Craft Collective, co-edits Book Reviews for MER, and serves as the 2024-2026 Town of Mamaroneck Author Laureate. melissajoplinhigley.com

Facebook: Melissa Joplin Higley
Instagram: @mjhigleypoet
Twitter/X: @melissajhigley

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► Melissa Joplin Higley's microchap & (selected) poems are available below. Download the single-page PDF by clicking the title.

Origami Microchap with Selected Poems

We Shake & Seek

Click title to download micro

Cover artwork by Kevin Higley

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Year after Year

we choose
for love
is a choosing
so tonight
I whisper
our name in
the silent hours
before dawn
as if
to work a spell
as if
my choosing
might be enough
for both
of us

After my therapist asks whether
I would still be drawn to you if
we met today for the first time…

18 years older,
at the Italian bakery,
overhearing
snippets of each
other’s order—your
black drip coffee
and gluten-free scone,
my half-caf latte and
corn muffin—I would
still choose you,
right here, right now,
where we stand
in line, waiting
for our orders
to be filled,
looking around
for a table
with two chairs.

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Poets