Robert Carr
Soldier and Commander
We are the timeless fuck in skinless
dark. We slide shining-smooth surfaces
inside each other. You’re my loved fat
woman, peach-breathed boy, bone-broke man.
I am your wife, beast-beloved, chameleon
-husband, whisper-girl.
Release of shit in a death-bed, spread
of blood shaken over birth. Salt of first cry, sugar
of breast milk, black rattle vomit.
Try me on, trade pluck of brow. We sit
back to back and share a braid.
Lean out, test the tug of hair.
Massachusetts-based poet Robert Carr is the author of Amaranth (Indolent Books, 2016) and The Unbuttoned Eye, a full-length collection forthcoming from 3: A Taos Press. Among other publications his poetry appears in the Bellevue Literary Review, Crab Orchard Review, The Massachusetts Review and Rattle. Robert is Developmental Editor with Indolent Books and an editor for the anthology Bodies and Scars, forthcoming from the Ghana Writes Literary Group. Additional information can be found at robertcarr.org.