a transcription of the poem read on the home page of this issue

by Erica Hunt

and not disappear in the dredging
the edited ledgers omit antiphonal groans

Reader, you were meant to be legible
even in the failure to communicate
your will to resist snatching defeat from
the jaws of easy victory the truth slips in as a figure of speech.

Reader step into my room
this page faces you
what will I miss if you blink
what blots the ink pens and hems the imagination
what hides in the brackish
back stories hostile to the wobbled word,
what resists being pinned to the truth?

Reader, we are carbon, and more
the exact degree of life is inestimable—
some of us chew ice and others suck chalk
some crave salt before there is savor
others can never be too full of sugar or bourbon
sucker punched and stunned by death’s pugnacious brawl
into dream time and song, extending both ends
night into day.

Touch, reader, we were meant to touch
to exchange definitions and feed the pulse of
language. I promise if you step in
it will propel you, me, it:
topple distinctions
ease doubt and belief, and
all that in between.

Poem copyright 2019 by Erica Hunt. All rights reserved.

See more poems from Erica Hunt on The Fight & The Fiddle: “Mood Librarian.” 

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Read more in this issue: Interview | Critical Essay | Writing Prompt