American Chordata: Magazine of New Writing Issue One, Spring 2015 | Seite 38

The Boy
You’ve seen the boy on the bus
Whose brothers beat him?
Seen him rock forward and back,
Eyes tracing the roadmap of cracks
In the backs of the stiff leather seats?
Where he wasn’t joined,
His hands rubbed his skinny thighs,
Chin to chest, he whispered into his lap?

20 • PO

Where he is today: listen to wind
Roll over the bus, catch in windows.

ETRY

I was young when I burned a bee’s nest,
Shot a BB through the wall,
Part flesh, part ashy paper.
I was young when I looked away from the boy,
Rested my head against the window on the bus, and felt
The rattling diesel babble through it all.
Think, though, of a bee-less world:
Somber faces among blossomless stalks,
Limbs ascending, unburdened,
In breathtaking, useless rows.