You are no better than the world
you live in / is what I sing to you tonight //
Don’t take it personally // You will find
love someday / seething screenface to
seething screenface / we sit with each other
/ far away / together / in the mist of our
mutual losses / ash-tagged & caked in
aspartame / our seditious hearts rung up on
rhabdo & rail margaritas / keychained to
the luckless paws of rabbits frozen to death
beneath the downspouts of our debased
country // Ready or not / our home has
nowhere left to live // All the streets here
have patriotic names // We prowl the edges
of our preserve / baby lions / dreaming of
bloody muzzles while we wait for our jaws
to react / long after the zebra has fled //
you live in / is what I sing to you tonight //
Don’t take it personally // You will find
love someday / seething screenface to
seething screenface / we sit with each other
/ far away / together / in the mist of our
mutual losses / ash-tagged & caked in
aspartame / our seditious hearts rung up on
rhabdo & rail margaritas / keychained to
the luckless paws of rabbits frozen to death
beneath the downspouts of our debased
country // Ready or not / our home has
nowhere left to live // All the streets here
have patriotic names // We prowl the edges
of our preserve / baby lions / dreaming of
bloody muzzles while we wait for our jaws
to react / long after the zebra has fled //
Image: “Born on Flag Day” by Chris Moss, licensed under CC 2.0
Adam Fell is the author of two books of poetry: Dear Corporation, (Forklift Books 2019) and I Am Not A Pioneer (2011). He has had more than thirty poems published in various journals and magazines, including Tin House; Crazyhorse; Forklift, Ohio; Diagram; Sixth Finch; jubilat; Ocean State Review; Poets.org; Pinwheel; Matter; and others. He is an Assistant Professor of English at Edgewood College in Madison, WI, where he co-curates the Monsters of Poetry reading series.
Latest posts by Adam Fell (see all)
- Life Among Reproductions - June 4, 2020