one poem by Stephanie Smith

Victim/offender

I guzzled

Hundred percent gasoline

Siphoned sweet like

Aftermarket modifications

Then, as a mute swan in flight,

Dry heaved nerve endings

Coerced confessions

Sidewalk cracks

Into your gular pouch

Now eat!

If I believed in the human soul

I’d ask you to wrap mine

In funeral gauze and yaks’ wool

Flecked with Venetian glass

And drop it in a mobius strip

Protected by bearded vultures for

I am their god; their sorrows are

Hidden in the contours of my face