Question
Are we meant to know everything
Pile the world’s problems
In the backpack we strap on our shoulders?
Fill our wells with fresh grief
With every morning’s sunrise?
Daylilies are already blooming
and now there are dead armadillos
on the road south of Madisonville.
On Little River reflections
complete the circle
of dead trees fallen in the water.
Reflect on the daylilies.
Reflect on the armadillos.
Reflect on the tornado
that ripped through Mayfield
and Dawson Springs
and where does that take you?
Fragments of refrigerator, sheet
rock, canceled checks. Mattress
sizzling like a lit box
of sparklers over hot
power line. Eight confirmed
on Peach Valley Road.
Dot & Jimmy
in the storm shelter
curled together
like a braided wick. Blood
dripping like chocolate down Joy
Sipley’s neck. Six horses loose on Gum
Springs Road. Flattened
pickups on the highway tossed
like discarded juice boxes. With ballpoint
I scrawl frantically
in my skinny reporter’s
notebook. F-4
170 mph. Still no first
responders. A mini-van
gnarled in a birch. Sanctuary
at First Presbyterian vanishes
to rubble, children’s wing
left standing. Down
Bledsoe Creek the torso
of a broken doll slides away.
Tonight, too
I stuttered uncontrollably.
Identical, disjoined syllables
kept spilling out of my mouth:
“I want to live my own life.”
These were the exact words I wanted to say.
Then, behind the trash can
I secretly ate food I’d cast deeply into the trash can,
and covered up, and covered up…
Author: Marin Bodakov
Translator: Katerina Stoykova
Some clamber
Some careen
Some crawl
But still comes it
Some deny
Some deflect
Some defer
But still comes it
Some whisper
Some wheedle
Some whimper
But still comes it
Death
Write a modern sentence.
Instead of “she floats mostly through the gates of life,”
say “nothing bites her but the front door.”
You will have to believe that she is asking for it.
She keeps going in the same way.
Toss old synecdoche.
Instead of “Hello, Old Sports and Blue Hairs,”
say “Do I look like I’m kidding?”
You can keep your v-shaped brow.
At this point, everyone keeps an extra in their pocket.
Send words through less tended landscapes.
Instead of “he hums with bees, scent of mirepoix wafting,”
say “that’s an ill-diced holy trinity for a Sunday!”
Do not burn towards a recipe any longer.
Bubble away in the bone until done.
