Thankfully / we are tankless / & the capitol / well / we run our fingers backward through the capitol’s gaunt undying pelt // Twenty-seven bones in my fist clenched around a stone // Fifty-four bones in your hands trying to pry that unhurled stone from my own // We control the means of seduction / touch our tasers together in the moon-veined Michigan dunes / sleep butt to butt in the soyfield / breast to back in the ruins of the burnt-out bodega // We flinch & fight & snare-kick sparks up from the broken concrete of the hospital parking lot // We jump the razorwire fence into the winter waterpark / skate the lazy river drainage /make out in our blankets at the top of the watercoaster // Above us the moon like a dead owl’s eye // Below us snowdrifts sliver silver & unfurl in the empty wave pool // We’d forget how to text in a week if we could just stay here / foraging in the safety of each other’s pulse-point / lite-brite black-site / half-life / blood-kite // Searchlight kissing spotlight / Sleeping gazer to gazer / our lips clinking together like tipsy rich-ass snifters / digging lighters from our purses to burn the bad tippers down // What is the past but a fire there’s no way to douse? / What is the present but a blizzard of flies lifting up as one buzzing body from the mulberry-bruised sidewalk? / What is the future but a medieval british archer flashing us the V to prove she still has her fingers / that you haven’t captured her & cut them off yet / that she can still draw the bow & that the next arrow / the next arrow / honey / is coming straight for you //
"Dear Corporation" is published here with the kind permission of the author.
The ALL Review is pleased to present our How to Live series, poems chosen to help readers navigate these difficult and rapidly changing times.
