<damageSpan desc="water stained">
who among her uncles would not have fought our shadow
-brother for her
to carry her off? my chariot glints with suncapped waves
his with shadows
snakes of tongues roll growls and yelps in mouths of the beasts
I will not call them dogs
that drag his hearse and I have dolphins
whales sharks
if I need them and of course sea horses who could carry for her
whatever I made
in her—I mean I could have taken him and would never
have needed to fool
dear sweet Kore into swallowing pearls, she’d take my
milfoil
seeds to press between her plump
palms
and blow on them before quaffing them
with salt
before I was Uncle Sea and step-guardian of girls who tried to make her
keep her knees clean
she called me father and her daddy Zeus gave her
up to corpselord
and if those girls had run a little faster, risking grass stains on bleach, I’d still have brought
my pitchfork
despite my brother-lord’s decree
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Elizabeth Kate Switaj is a Liberal Arts Instructor at the College of the Marshall Islands and a Contributing Editor to Poets' Quarterly. She holds a Ph.D. in English from Queen's University Belfast and an M.F.A. in Poetics and Creative Writing from New College of California. Her first collection of poetry, Magdalene & the Mermaids, is published by Paper Kite Press.
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Jacqueline Jules
Obsolete Angers
J. Bradley
Yelp Review:
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Yelp Review:
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Amy Schriebman Walter
Hope in a Yellow Dress
Miho Kinnas
Earlobes
Mark Povinelli
Notes I
Notes II
Kenneth Nichols
The Best Writers
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John Patsynski
The Money Weapon
Aileen Bassis
Pellucid Musing
Travis Macdonald
When the Map's Crease
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Kris Hall
Pyromanian I
Pyromanian II
Claire Scott
Harbor Lights
Elizabeth Kate Switaj
Poseidon's Canto