—My form against those at border—

Dawn Lundy Martin

[arbitrary line] [perish]

	knocking among other refugees

	—the islands
	—no one to help
	—thousands buried by water

A butchered animal at my feet.

Wolves howl. Soot falls from sky.

The rescuers are never prepared.
And we, here, amid a failure of images.

Scrub a spot whiter than before.
Demarcate before there is nothing left.

Breach into white sand. The dead ache so.

From “The Laceration”

As if the tender body is. As if the will is tender

And like any creature that has its hood up, you

take a photo of yourself in front of a window, rain

so dark, the day/perspective so desired. You are so

desperate for beautiful adventure, the lights shut off

and the sweat of some hot stranger in your mouth. As if

Dawn Lundy Martin

2021

From “Perspective is Supposed to Yield Clarity”

She said, I wish I prayed, I would pray for you. And,

we all wanted a shape of prayer in our brains, taking over

instead of it chomping on itself. Stupid little elf. God has

never come to me. We surrender in the teeming utterance

of materials soaked with sentences already made in air

and by machines. The country says Freedom, crushed under

Dawn Lundy Martin

2020

Nothingness

I don’t want to say anything. What is it to be saying? Force speech, rape speech. I have no subjectivity or light subjectivity. Speaking, defunct. Land mass floats. And the forests have been felled. And the antlers, snapped. Morphed lips, already sewn. Most of us are keen to mouth the word, “beast.” Everyone is talking talking talking like dentures, clack clack, but nothing is really said. Or so much chatter static. I am not saying anything either, am waiting and breathing. My body is speaking. Expressing the thingness of the thing. It chats at me, motoring.

Dawn Lundy Martin

2019

Poems

—My form against those at border—

More by this poet

From “The Laceration”

From “Perspective is Supposed to Yield Clarity”

Nothingness

Poems

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—My form against those at border—

More by this poet

From “The Laceration”

From “Perspective is Supposed to Yield Clarity”

Nothingness

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