Jane Wong
Pulling tap roots from one’s mouth is not ideal.
It is best to avoid sickness at all costs.
Lost, a horse lies on its side. This is not right.
Do not look into its eye. Do not touch
the heaving chest. I had to
believe in hypnosis, in horseflies. Warming the air
until day became night.
The horse’s body caved in, I gave into
ruin. In winter, moles tunneled
underneath our house.
How does that saying go? If you are ugly,
you better not show your face.
And so I fell asleep in the basement again,
in a pile of lint. Full of moth rot,
mercy. Look at me, I’d say to the horse.
Look at me make this forest.
Jane Wong received her M.F.A. from the University of Iowa and is a former U.S. Fulbright Fellow. She is the recipient of scholarships from the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference and the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown. Poems appear recently or are forthcoming in CutBank, EOAGH, Mid-American Review, Barrow Street, Octopus, The Journal, and OH NO. She lives in Seattle.
“When I lived in Missoula, my roommate Chad would bring back elk skulls and leave them out on our front porch. No one messed with our house.”