Saturn.1
butterfly on a tissue box
not a real one
a painting
a monarch
one more sign
for anguish
poured and
poured a choice to feel or
stack bricks between
I was sad when my
talented friend started designing
television commercials
he told me to grow up
but the rocks in the desert I touch
signal an endless new place something
without money saying “never tire of
demanding love for the world”
Copyright © 2015 by CAConrad. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on December 8, 2015, by the Academy of American Poets.
“‘Saturn.1’ is part of the serial poem ‘Width of a Witch’ written in Marfa, Texas, while I was on a Lannan Foundation Fellowship. The series was written inside a (Soma)tic poetry ritual titled ‘Marfa Poetry Machine in 36 Things’ where I did thirty-six things a day for thirty-six days, such as honoring living poets each morning, carrying a sweet potato around town dressed in a purple glitter skirt, and getting on the floor to follow along with video footage of the experimental dancer Mary Wigman’s ‘Witch Dance’ like a workout video for the soul!”
—CAConrad
CAConrad
