Poem of the Day
Study of Children
By Asha Futterman
did you know
that you all work for me?
I asked them as a joke
did you know
that you all work for me?
I asked them as a joke
I sharpened knives
All night.
To welcome you
In my spiderweb
You got caught,
My precious.
The sun drills a hole between my shoulder blades
I am ashamed that I want self-degrading things
I burn for no reason like a lantern in daylight
Overshadowed by colors
Like the deep
Sea of the dictionary
“Alas,” he thinks, “a perfect day for a walk.”
But first he steps outside to take a look.
no thank you I don’t want to spend my life
giving extreme unction to a crowd of toads
At the party: they surround him and his chair.
“So it was in the morning, then,
that you first put this hat on your knees?”
You were thinking about something as luscious and royal as a dumbbell,
Small and cold, about to tilt, then smash to silver coins.
You were thinking about something so illogical and blissful,
To keep an assignation with oneself, one must, as a matter of course, break in two.
There is you in the snow by the banks of the river, your lips cold and blue,
Your hands fulminating with your first true love.
Resist. Resist:
Dehind, dehist.
Return the clear glass to the kitchen forthwith.