Long Pig: a Poem

New Work by Kaveh Akbar

April 19, 2017  By Kaveh Akbar
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Long Pig

 

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I came to speak about luck but I fear dismantling what is already
simple so I will say only that if you are fortunate enough to have
a body you shouldn’t leave it lying wet on the floor where anyone
could shred it to bits it is worth treating well   see also the perfect
pine replica of my breastbone which fell off the wall shattering across
the tile   see also the sixteen-celled fetus half-mine lost in the plumbing
of an apartment we lovingly called the Trash Castle   say something or say
nothing the options are always the same and often so are the results

 

some birds have feathers but can’t fly and even they cherish
their flesh bathing it in sand or snow   every animal longs to be bare
to chew through its fur and melt directly into weather like dry ice there is
a moment of startle when a thing really sees itself for the first time
a shock of hey me it’s me you in this way we are all each others’ mascots
equal and opposite   in my dreams I am a cannibal eating long pig
in a strange unmappable country   it seeps into my living I stay a throb
of hunger and brainstem if you move even a little I will take you in my mouth

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Kaveh Akbar
Kaveh Akbar
Kaveh Akbar is the author of Calling a Wolf a Wolf and the forthcoming collection Pilgrim Bell. He is also the editor of a forthcoming anthology The Penguin Book of Spiritual Verse. He is the poetry editor at The Nation, and teaches at Purdue University and in the low-residency MFA programs at Randolph College and Warren Wilson.








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