Out of Research Into Reveries
Give up the brain
Offer down its clumsy
meditations its blurred face
of fury its hellbound
policies bugged into my throat
Cough out
that sickled attitude the ragged shelves
downing my ankles every
era of hibernation
It’s all in the performance the butcher
operating on slabs
of my identity the bereaved dissecting
memories of an octopus
Lift out far from of it
Careen the elbows out of murk
with wine taken by
the midsummer full
moon
Constantly stoneward
hunting toward heartstill
Copyright © 2019 by Mai Der Vang. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on October 21, 2019, by the Academy of American Poets.