MY BODY IS AN ECO-SYSTEM
Down to a stick of gum someone
spat out on a sidewalk. My body is a courtyard
of blooms in Spring. My body is a vintage gas station,
smelling of diesel oil. Or a lonely landlady
in a nightgown washed too many times. My body
is a rainy night in Pittsburgh, a city
of taxicab horns. My body is an inferno
of other people’s grief. Invaded by a boss
with clammy hands, my body is a plantation.
My limbs are a painter’s studio of colored rags,
a wall of tears in brushstrokes. My body has been
leased and swindled. Has waited in offices, feet
cold on stirrups. My body has been evicted, sprayed,
cropped, graphed, subjugated, interrupted, terrorized.
My body has flown out of conversations on parachutes.
Has sometimes had to leap from buildings.
My body has been tendered by soft hands.
My body is a sanctuary. A dictionary, a long hallway.
I never knew my tireless vessel had this many rooms.
Cynthia Atkins (she/her) is the author of Psyche’s Weathers, In The Event of Full Disclosure (CW Books), and Still-Life With God (Saint Julian Press 2020), and a collaborative chapbook from Harbor Editions, 2022. Her work has appeared in many journals, including Alaska Quarterly Review, Barzakh, BOMB, Cimarron Review,, Diode, Green Mountains Review, Indianapolis Review, Los Angeles Review, Rust + Moth, North American Review, NYQ, Permafrost, SWWIM, Thrush, Tinderbox, and Verse Daily. Formerly, Atkins worked as the assistant director for the Poetry Society of America. She earned her MFA from Columbia University and has earned fellowships and prizes from Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, The Writer’s Voice, and Writers@Work. Atkins lives on the Maury River of Rockbridge County, Virginia, with artist Phillip Welch and their family. More work and info at: www.cynthiaatkins.com