%%%

TROUBLE BREATHING 

ZACKARY MEDLIN

The night sky forgets itself
like a thrashing Chinook
hooked deep in the gills,
gnashing its own blood
with the bone-pale shards
entrenched in its black gums.

Look at how goddamned ugly
the stars are, like scars peeking
through the gauze and seeping.
This is all we have to navigate by.
It’s enough. Stay the course.

But, Captain, I fear what’s below,
what seethes in blood. But more
than I fear, I surge and yearn
to resist definition by those
connect-the-dot gods at odds
with what they’ve created.
I too have the bite of a titan
and a taste for fresh, familiar flesh.