ISSN: 1941-4137
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
Mariel Fechik is a musician and writer from Chicago. She works for an educational nonprofit, and she writes music reviews for Atwood Magazine and Third Coast Review. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Lines + Stars, Cosmonauts Avenue, Black Napkin Press, and others. She is always singing.
Gifted Bodies
Time is measured only
by the unveiling of our bodies
in the light
a filtered blue
I ask only for your hand, the
rise of your chest
an immutable thrum
One day our bodies
will lay untethered in
a violet field
flowering
I had a title for this poem before I had a poem. I'd been listening to this podcast called Criminal, and in one episode, they discuss what are known as "body farms." These are forensic research sites where they study how the human body decays under different conditions — most of them simply laying out in a field. Bodies donated to the research are known as "gifted bdies." The whole thing was kind of terrifying, but there was a moment where they spoke of how many of these bodies, at certain points in decomposition, have tons of wildflowers growing out of them. I thought this was so strangely beautiful, and then wrote a poem around this idea, and the way that bodies relate to each other — in their simplicity and complexity.
Glass: A Journal of Poetry is published monthly by Glass Poetry Press.
All contents © the author.
All contents © the author.
