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2023 Laura A. Rice Poetry Prize

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Body on Body

by Olivia Chovanes

Our blues don’t dissipate like they used to, we are warp and weft; stars suspended in smugness and smog vacation and inhale cigars letting out thick coughs as they stack greasy cards and chips, as we on Earth spend solitary nights dislocating ourselves from the pelvic bones of humanity and the rib cages of reluctant ancestors Bleeding into blue and sowing our seeds for the coming days of sunshine where all our bubblegum promises and pinky swears might materialize into something more than timid talk of sidewalk chalk shaped like bodies leaving sullen faces toe-tagged and torpid until the lights go out. We live in toothache times and snare trap trickery.
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