Arsenic Lobster poetry journal
Issue Nine
Winter 2005
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Too Long
Sean Kilpatrick

Too long have I mistaken your breath

for the ignition of secrets.


The sun for your gallbladder,

dialing its symphonies of cremation.


Autopsy for the horizon, yanking

the orange prophecy of tongue


out through the evening’s neck,

past my dinner-swollen belt.

This euthanasia of atmosphere

is understandable, recommended even.


This killing of the sky with surgical rhythms.

God bless the giant tourniquet raised in vain.


Or were we running down a muzzle,

praying for more indifferent rains to sweep


roadkill us into a calming toupee?

It’s the smell that forces me to love you.


About Sean Kilpatrick

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