by Matt Morgan
Poetry
Now that it’s mostly gone—
the electricity shorting out
in the rolling barrel drum
of my brain—now that
that’s gone, the zaps—
the brain zaps—such a bad science word—
the unusually non-technical term
for such a nasty night sky.
Turn of the neck too fast, zap.
To see what’s in the other lane, zap.
To see what’s flying so low, zap.
To see how tightly we unfold, zap.
* * *
What is the lowest dose of language
that can still move a body past war
with himself? A sugary placebo,
I no longer trust the way I dissolve.
Originally from Mississippi, Matt Morgan now lives in Kalamazoo, Michigan, where he teaches Shakespeare and Atwood to precocious middle-schoolers. You can find more of his creative work in recent issues of Catamaran Literary Review, The Tishman Review, Cold Mountain Review, Midwest Quarterly, and New Orleans Review.