virgo

cough in your throat, snake

in the woodpile, outside, the

poets remember too loudly—

quiet, please, time is passing.

every morning cracks us

open like a boxer’s teeth,

every day we sit in the shade &

think god, somebody has got to

do something about all these weeds.

this is the order of the earth; first

land & then the concept

of land. next

the rain sells our secrets

back to us. next

we are strangers in this

town we love. next

the house, after much

deliberation, burns down. next

we are strangers everywhere

else as well. we huddle close to whisper

we swallow the pulse of the stars we 

divide our love like robbery cash we 

swallow the pills at sunrise we take

turns at the wheel we record everything

we swallow the absence until it is gone

& forgive all we can bear. everything

has a place. i am afraid ours might be 

clutching our knees to our chest on the curb 

outside the hospital. i am afraid every poem 

might become a curse, like ivy strangling our

memory with romance. i am afraid when 

i remember but also when i’m asleep. 

every night we embark on the journey of 

persephone—a total eclipse of the limbic

system. 

no but really, this is the order 

of the earth; 

first a boy gets cut out 

in the shape of a sky, next 

a boy learns why no other 

boy is in the shape of a sky, next 

i carry my heartburn with 

me down the street like a glass bird next 

a morning cracks the window 

of the house & we slip into it 

next a seizure performs the labor 

our bodies are too frail for next 

we become at last familiar 

to all things, just long enough 

that it becomes our job to 

pull up all the goddamn weeds

---

Tyler King is a nonbinary poet in Columbus, Ohio. They are formerly the editor of the online literary magazine Flail House Press, and their work has appeared in Ghost City Press, mutiny! magazine, The Louisville Review of Books, and other places.