“Torture Horse,” a poem by Jessie Janeshek

Torture Horse

See my body move
so many nuclear                                beauties in tinfoil
draping the rage.

My mouth is too small
to matter to anyone.
Just eat the hooves, the woods, you can leave

Niagara Falls                        a restoration                          labyrinthine

a curvy woman                  in a wasp costume
in the copper hallway.

Sometimes I’m absorbent                  or my poison fails
and I try to bite off                              your non-dominant hand
since how am I supposed to                                 achieve a suntan?

I can’t look at the old dolls                                                a gun in the grass
proof I’ve done enough                                 the abyss of habit.

Sleep is for strangers and                  vampire babies
hummingbirds that emerge                           like maggots from nothing.

It’s how I work late
how I don’t like the way         you bleed god in the details
two axe blows  my eggs.

Find the rock with my age on it.
Find him rinsing the rock
with my age in the river. Repeat.

Jessie Janeshek’s third full-length book of poems MADCAP is forthcoming from Stalking Horse Press in 2019. Her first two books are The Shaky Phase (Stalking Horse Press, 2017) and Invisible Mink (Iris Press, 2010). Her chapbooks include Spanish Donkey/Pear of Anguish (Grey Book Press, 2016), Rah-Rah Nostalgia (dancing girl press, 2016), Supernoir (Grey Book Press, 2017), Auto-Harlow (Shirt Pocket Press, 2018), Hardscape (Reality Beach, forthcoming), and Channel U (Grey Book Press, forthcoming). Read more at jessiejaneshek.net. 

Image: russellaarondesigns.com

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