It is hard not to envy the corpse
of the roach I imagine
Kafka studying, prodding,
dreaming of enlarging to Gregor’s
living tomb. How it must weigh,
this anonymous legacy—
how immortal the hard back,
segmented legs and the wings
(never used). These days,
I feel like a roach and hope
one day my own murder
might be made so beautiful
by some small, sad God.
Use my belly. Collage my limbs.
Make of my pathetic scuttling
some meager, mournful tune.
John Elizabeth Stintzi (they/she) is an award winning writer, cartoonist, and artist. They are the author of the novels My Volcano and Vanishing Monuments, the poetry collection Junebat, the poetry chapbooks Flamingos in the Greenhouse and Plough Forward the Higgs Field, and the forthcoming short story collection Bad Houses. Their work has appeared in Ploughshares, The Malahat Review, Kenyon Review, and Best Canadian Poetry. They are currently at work illustrating their first graphic novel: Automaton Deactivation Bureau.
the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan
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