American Chordata: Magazine of New Writing Issue One, Spring 2015 | Page 41

Noise and Scent
Surrounded
By the monied people, thanksgiving song
Of circular saws biting steps from planks,
Heavy scent-flushed blossoms plunking wetly
Against the sidewalk, young lovers,
And not of it.
The air is a river without banks, the world is always flooded,
The heavy coin clanks and covers the sewer, the cars
Roll over it.
And what of it?
23 • PO
ETRY

Subtract I am from later drafts, absence
Is all. Of the
Eight dreams of hell only two reveal the face
Of the inverted snake, hanging
Like a microphone cable: you
Speak into him and he regurgitates
An answer. Interior. Bloodsong.