Elyse Fenton
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Let’s be a little less brave together
say the zinnias to each other, heads
like olive frittatas sliding unbroken
across the pan. Down the block
it’s chickens chickens and a ruminant
wind bringing autumn back into
the equation. Choose instead
the tractor’s absence, bankruptcy
of hives, the universe bending down
to pull a thread from its cuff
and flash a third row of teeth. Figs
gyrate into light’s densest coil
so the sugars coalesce, wine stain
into bruise, prow into broken
waves. Fist into throat. When I said
we should love with more fury I meant
even the laryngial crows, even the kleenex
thrashed in the laundry to lace.
Elyse Fenton is the author of the poetry collection, Clamor, which was awarded the 2010 Dylan Thomas Prize. Her second manuscript, Sweet Insurgent, won the Alice Fay di’Castagnola Prize from the Poetry Society of America. Her poetry and prose have been published in American Poetry Review, Best New Poets, Pleiades, Prairie Schooner, Zzyzyva, The New York Times, and elsewhere.