Dead Dead Darlings
One sentence held the echoes of a room without furniture. One narrowed like a corridor leading from the outside in. One sentence grew out of fashion with the disco-ball maker. One was radial & wheeling, & the verb spun at the center. One forecasted an avalanche. One melted on the sand. One widened its plot for the burying of corpses. This one came zoo-tamed eating with other nocturnals. This one came caged like a hotel fire alarm. This one was a wound. This one a stitch. This a cicatrix.
Originally published in PEN America Poetry. Copyright © 2017 by Carolina Ebeid. Used with the permission of the author.