ISSN: 1941-4137
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
Christine Taylor, a multiracial English teacher and librarian, resides in her hometown Plainfield, New Jersey. She serves as a reader and contributing editor at OPEN: Journal of Arts & Letters. Her work appears or is forthcoming in Modern Haiku, apt, The Rumpus, and The Paterson Literary Review among others.
Poets Resist
Edited by Rachel Bunting
April 11, 2018
Edited by Rachel Bunting
April 11, 2018
To My Fellow Clinic Escorts: Englewood, NJ
May you arrive at the clinic promptly at 7:30 a.m. — the first patients
come early for their 8 o’clock appointments even in rain and snow.
May you don a neon vest, reflective panels glittering in the rising sun,
wear this “Deathscort” badge with honor and pride. May you stop
traffic that tears up the one-way downtown drag, usher her safely
to the curb. May you hold her hand and open the door. May you lift
your head towards the open sky when a protester wails
on his amplifier, “I feel sorry for my brother who has to bear the burden
of being an innocent white man” after a pedestrian has called the cops,
again, your laughter will quake the heavens. May you pop that Advil
you’ve stashed in your jeans pocket, and no, it doesn’t matter
that you’ve already downed three cups of bitter black coffee.
Please get out of the buffer zone. May you swallow the memories
of your own past assault(s), body-check the bastard who’s trying
to slip a patient a pamphlet of false promises (We’ll care for you
and your baby!), watch out for the pothole in the sidewalk
that catches garbage-water when they dump the bins. May you
just listen to the story she tells: the struggle to feed other children
when dad’s been laid off, the first-generation college degree
in arm’s reach, the tumor that has claimed 70% of the fetus;
each story becomes your own. May you fall to your knees
when you hear that “God has called women to be submissive
to their godly leaders” and praise the Mother Goddess
as we bear witness to the choice to honor life, the heart
of these journeys. Down the street, sirens.
Poets Resist is published by Glass Poetry Press.
All contents © the author.
All contents © the author.
