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2023 Academy of American Poets Prize

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The Colorado River (A to Z)

by Jake Friedman
 

as if it was an accident of accounting my anxiety aridified the absent acre-feet the bodies in barrels breaching the water the bathtub rings bleaching the basin walls cowboys compacts congress conquistadors drip drop drip drop how easily an error elides into era a future flowered to fallow fields gardening the grief generations of growth a gallows the government grandfathered in here is the history of a hypothetical hydrology the hallowed heritage of homesteads and herds innocence ideology it’s all idle isn’t it an imminent judgment kairos kaboom las vegas los angeles lost cities long-term mortality merely mirrors the moisture this nation nearly negated nature and now it’s narrating it’s own obituary o prodigal pitiful precipitous population o parable of paralysis o palliative plea it’s a question of quantity a quench quickening renounce the settlement of this terrible thirst or tarry as the river simply trickles away talk as usual urgency is no use until the volume is violence or void the west will never willingly withdraw witness is wasted why wait wake up xenic xeric x-ed out you’re zero

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