dripped on the blanket while air rustled tamarind trees.
Chekhov drank a Thai iced tea and plummeted out of this poem.
A flock of circles twittered in the hacksaw bushes
rasping songs from lavender throats. The birds feasted
on hull berries, stale-bread cruxes, and old coffee filters.
The flummox jammed his body against the plow.
By midnight, Kurtz reached Botswana,
where King Leopold of Belgium quaked in fear
against the African sun’s sour light.
Native rebellions spilled flesh over Victoria Falls
after hacking illusions with dream blades.
The New York Times offered twenty-five rusted words
on page 3.
–
Jon Wesick is a regional editor of the San Diego Poetry Annual. He’s published hundreds of poems and stories in journals such as the Atlanta Review, Berkeley Fiction Review, I-70 Review, Lowestoft Chronicle, New Verse News, Paterson Literary Review, Pearl, Pirene’s Fountain, Slipstream, Space and Time, and Underside Stories. His most recent books are The Shaman in the Library and The Prague Deception. http://jonwesick.com