The keyboard sounds like a mouse’s
footsteps when he taps, middle finger
of his right hand bent, unable to touch
flesh against palm. Walking to relieve
himself at night, one eye discerns
a mushroom pillow; the other, a pile
of dirty clothes. The sprouted, rotting
alphabet left hanging in the backyard
elm after a long fever still lingers like
monuments he once knew the names
of. The weatherwoman announces she
weighs less than a bison calf seconds
before a commercial, as his shadow
settles over the screen, a sanctuary
for things cheaper than a chicken bone
and older than a warranted embrace.
Renoir Gaither writes from St. Paul, MN. His interests include concrete poetry, anarchism, and Black freedom struggles in the diaspora. His poetry has recently appeared in Soliloquies Anthology, Into the Void, Crab Fat Magazine, and the book We Are Antifa: Expressions against Fascism, Racism and Police Violence in the United States and Beyond.
Latest posts by Renoir Gaither (see all)
- Self-Portrait at Sixty-Three - August 4, 2021
