Cathexis Northwest Press
THAT THERE IS SOMETHING I SHOULD REMEMBER TO DO; POST-APOCALYPTIC CRIMES
By: Jimmy Symington IV
THAT THERE IS SOMETHING
I SHOULD REMEMBER TO DO
I drain nightÂ
for its ashes.
I baptize salt
to store the sun. Â
I gather what
little bone is left Â
under my feet.
what have you beenÂ
doing with all this time?
with all this time?
I have named years
with my hands
as I ground feathersÂ
with my teeth.
I clothe the airÂ
with words, Â
and watch mythÂ
accept Earth.Â
POST-APOCALYPTIC CRIMES
we must put to sleepÂ
the last heart,
to obscure the purposeÂ
already lost in our eyes.Â
only to be balancedÂ
by annihilated curiosity.
all the figures yell into the sun
which serpent whispers now?
there are maggots in the kitchen.
spit will close our dimension Â
still hunt at my back.
I am a criminal,
and the apocalypse, over. Â
Jimmy Symington IV holds an MFA from Columbia University where he was a poetry fellow, and a BA in philosophy from Stony Brook University, where he received the Socratic Legacy Award. He is a contributing poetry editor at American Chordata. He currently lives and works in New York.