Trina Porte
two poems from to do list
tornado/molested
deadly silence
then crushing chaos
until all safety
blows apart before you
her childhood
split in two
like a lamppost by a blade of wheat
once nourished each new day
she’d reach into life
as into bowls of candy
now lethal days implode in her
like bursting atoms
that instantly clear landscapes of all life signs
we have the radar
we’ve all practiced what to do
so why do we ignore those screaming sirens
and simply run to see the damage
(originally published in Photography Quarterly #87)
unlearned behavior
swimming away some stress last night
i thought how nice it would be
if my favorite nertia, un, were possible
as in “unnertia—
something that unhappens to you”
unnews is good news
would be the title of the daily newspaper
and i could read stories about
great unhappenings in the world:
on the anniversary of her unrape
the poet unwrote a series of poems
about unviolence against women
and we are delighted to report
the birth of the 7,000,000,014th person
a girl
born smiling for the first time
unhaving to cry
to take her first breath