ISSN: 1941-4137
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
Jessica Q. Stark is a PhD Candidate in the English department at Duke University. Her poetry and/or illustrations have appeared in Lute & Drum, Tethered by Letters, and Potluck. Her first poetry collection, Savage Pageant, is forthcoming from Birds LLC. She writes a poetry zine for the Internet called INNANET.
Also by Jessica Q. Stark:
Two Poems
Psychogenic Illness I & II
Poets Resist
Edited by Krista Cox
July 15, 2018
Edited by Krista Cox
July 15, 2018
Everyday Phenomena
Today I awoke to walls and
Circumstance: tidy entries
for small hands clasping
wire. Yesterday, you took
ten whole steps. My face
left gasping — I couldn’t grab
palms fast enough before you
fell. There are mirrors of our
selves caught on two sides
of an imaginary set of lines.
Taking steps on chain-linked
lilies, crushed petal underfoot.
One of our ghosts is waiting,
the other is counting thread.
Aluminum blankets are an
invention for the idea of human
temperature without warmth —
save kindness, kindle, visions
of a Pink Panther comforter
left out to dry — tumbling cat.
Science never provided a
good antidote for love, for
thought, or a means to end
causes of human suffering.
Find me a way underground
out of hallway and uniforms.
Find us the root and mess of
all of these tidy encasements.
Would you point me in the
direction of my afterbirth,
splayed out like all of my
important organs placed
outside, no woolen sheet
or ribcage for comfort?
Don’t look for the legal term
for that kind of discrepancy:
all of these hearts beating out
of body, just walking around.
Poets Resist is published by Glass Poetry Press.
All contents © the author.
All contents © the author.
