Despy Boutris
Prayer
& today I pray my feet learn
to face forward, learn a straight line
is the shortest distance
between two points. That the squirrels
stop pilfering fruit from the fig tree.
That the cancer quits. That my nails
refuse to tear & harden into hatchets
that spook the spirits haunting my head.
That this state stops turning to flame.
That my spine straightens, learns
the meaning of height. That my name
becomes something more
than mispronounced. That my hurts
heal like razorcuts, scab over & then scar.
That the scars fade, no sleeves soaked red.
That I find the sweet spot in the backwoods
of this life, that somewhere
between rapture and rupturing.
*****
Aftermath
The police always ask
about your whereabouts.
Where were you
when it happened?
They flash their badges,
glowing like gold,
and you’re ready
to apologize already,
feel like they’re speaking
a foreign tongue,
ready to sanction you
for your poor judgment,
the tequila
on your breath.
Like they’ll campaign
for your coquetry,
your courtesy
to the point
of conspiracy.
They ask,
Why didn’t you
just push him off?
Bio
Despy Boutris's writing has been published or is forthcoming in Ploughshares, Copper Nickel, American Poetry Review, The Gettysburg Review, Colorado Review, The Journal, Prairie Schooner, and elsewhere. Currently, she teaches at the University of Houston and serves as Poetry Editor for Gulf Coast, Guest Editor for Palette Poetry and Frontier, and Editor-in-Chief of The West Review.
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