STILL-LIFE WITH CHOKE PEAR
Conditioned by harm,
I was always told
Where to go
Or to not move at all.
Trust was a blood sport.
Hunger, heretical.
First, the defiance:
I was the lastborn
Thieved into speaking
Against the bright heel
Of the hound.
Then, the penance:
A sentence
Carved out in the jaw.
At my kindest, I am
Always to blame.
Not once
Did I want this
To be planted,
Let alone bloom.
____________________________________________________________________
BLACKOUT
When you left for the last time,
I stayed up all night waiting
For the hillside to give.
Then, hail.
Behind the gas station, I found
Our ghosts unraveling themselves
Out of aerosol-soaked rags.
The ghost brother, his face
As hideous as his sister’s.
We were hunted down.
Then, the world.
____________________________________________________________________
RICHARD QUIGLEY is currently an MFA candidate in poetry at Columbia University. He lives and works in New York.