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  • The American Poetry Review

    TWO POEMS

    May 01, 2020 1 minute
    PETER MISHLER

    Woke Up at the Edge of Hasbro

    Woke up at the edgeof Hasbro,at the guardrail,with thestill interred.Helmet free,I drank my spit.Extracted five-plus yearsof garbage from my ears.Had to unlearnmy learningin the navellesscomics of Prince Valiant.Spoke sternlyto my two-tailed mammoncurled against its tree.Our punishments,we devoured themby hand.Ground themto a kind of talc.Unharmed nowby the chipped platedropt, one depthswollen withdepth’s becoming,but not preparedfor solitude.Its corridorswere large and wakeful.Where a stonecould amass,or a callus on a thumb.In the bedpan,watched the namingof my parents,saw them ledbeneath the vaultingof a manger,charred and cold,to stand before the overseerfilling in his ovals.Studied the back blow,sipped fromthe birth-horn,looked up towarda ceilingof access fobsand entry wands,a whole lifetime of themsealed thereinin gelatin.And had the twonot shrieked?I might have offeredimmortality.

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