My Queer Country
by Joa Bren Smith
When I think of violence,
its acclimation to any country,
I think of cedars on limestone
cliff-edge and shore pines growing
wind-trained. By the look of it, death
is a bright thing married to the sun.
The day it gives, its warmth. The sun,
a rotund thing. Plump as death.
I want to find a country
whose stomach is done growing.
I want to cast the first stone.
I want to be a sure thing, stone
cold. There is money growing
in the fields now. The country,
I’m sure, smells of death.
I cannot say that I like death
after all of this. There is a time and a [country]
for everything. Says god, all wise and grown.
I have never stopped growing
queerness. Mine is a bright country.
Full of the sun, my country.