The first peach wing became
a quick red devotion, her purple nails
reflecting in the body of the black
lighter. The whole bird went powder
singing take me
out tonight. The squirrel was denser
and ran orange through blue

before it sighed to die by your side,
the pleasure and privilege
is mine. All this time her purple
lips pursed like they were wont
to whistle, to call something home
or at least let it know she noticed. The fish
fought hardest. The flame kept choking

on its tail, its dorsal. I was on the building
across the way. Watching the lights
below define the street, its pulse, its vector.
I had no fire of my own. I convinced myself
I could hear her nails on plastic, the flick
of the flint. Fish have no lungs, so they can
not sing. Worse yet, paper fish don’t have

any need for oxygen at all. So I know I didn’t
hear it catch the creeping chorus, croak back now
I know how Joan of Arc felt, croak back, you
have no right to take my place. I could not see
the last effigy, but it went up quick and judging
by her recoil, burnt her hand as her own
voice led the new refrain hang, she sang, the DJ.

First published in the Summer/Fall 2019 issue of The Southampton Review.

JOHN A. NIEVES has poems forthcoming or recently published in journals such as North American Review, Crazyhorse, Southern Review, Colorado Review, and Massachusetts Review. He won the Indiana Review Poetry Contest and his first book, Curio, won the Elixir Press Annual Poetry Award Judge’s Prize. He is associate professor of English at Salisbury University and an editor of The Shore Poetry. He received his MA from the University of South Florida and his PhD from the University of Missouri.

http://johnanieves.com/
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https://www.theshorepoetry.org/