The House, she says it as though it is already cloaked
by prairie, hidden in America’s bowels. An IV drip and handkerchief
folded first into triangular processions and then squared
off to farmland. In some sense of direction led by urgency,
we sped past the cabin to appear in the forest’s center.
“The only pets I had growing up were the rats in the attic and the sparrow,
who I’d greet first in the morning on the stairwell just before the kitchen,
its feathers replacing my fathers, chewing into his left thigh. And him,
imitating a bird and only then
had I looked down at my own legs
and began to wonder what was wrong with me.”
He is illiterate and yet he sits with the newspaper.
What comes as a revelation is not sight but his opinion
on matters outside of pictures.
Before the pulpit: an antlered sheep. And at the nave there was Envy,
keeping its hands preoccupied with the wool in a state of enclosure.
She watched them take grabs at the hood as she swept what remained of religion
in orison, “If you can ‘only pray in these times of solidarity,’ there are still words to worsen.”
We weren’t made to suffer but to know things would perhaps diminish in the lens of
brow-line glasses.
God, as benevolent and silent, responded: “I’m quite proud to let you live between my feet,”
He, too, is a loving child.
Lance Chaney is currently studying English at Lake Land College in hopes of becoming a
poet. When he is not studying, he can be found writing in his hometown or working at the
Mattoon Public Library. He is a recipient of the Gwendolyn Brooks Youth Poetry Award.
"newspaper" by zoetnet is licensed under CC BY 2.0.
