(fragments from a handwritten epistle)
Since we last spoke, a few more sticks of dynamite
have been dropped on Nebraska.
Not death, the paradise I begin to fear
with each bite of reality.
I hope every day.
I learn how to starve better,
how to become vertebral red.
In absentia, the truth sweeps the ground
with half-written books.
Recently, I rounded my inquisitors up
to force-feed them the fundamentals of spring.
Shhht! Not a bad word in my ear!
The language made me a strange creature.
All that youth, so unreliable, unnecessary.
Eventually, I shake the dust off my clothes and
keep on walking. No doubt,
people like us will never possess a sole
thing.
Maria Stadnicka
Illustration Nick Victor