Ars Poetica with Tin of Fish
by Eugenia Leigh
They bring you four loaves and a tin of fish,
then expect you to respond
like a god. You fail
to remember the lyrics to the miracle.
Look at them
strung out on hot desire, mauled
with the chase of new heavens.
You marvel
how humans this beautiful can believe
they are this battered,
and you wish to scream out
their names,
name by name,
tell them they were knit
in their dead mothers’ wombs, tell them
they were astonishingly made.
But who are you
to say they are worth more
than the cold-blooded vertebrates
stinking up that tin?
then expect you to respond
like a god. You fail
to remember the lyrics to the miracle.
Look at them
strung out on hot desire, mauled
with the chase of new heavens.
You marvel
how humans this beautiful can believe
they are this battered,
and you wish to scream out
their names,
name by name,
tell them they were knit
in their dead mothers’ wombs, tell them
they were astonishingly made.
But who are you
to say they are worth more
than the cold-blooded vertebrates
stinking up that tin?
Eugenia Leigh is the author of Blood, Sparrows and Sparrows (Four Way Books), the winner of the 2015 Debut-litzer Prize in Poetry. Her writing has appeared in numerous publications including Indiana Review, The Collagist, North American Review, and the Best New Poets 2010 anthology. The recipient of fellowships and awards from Poets & Writers Magazine, Kundiman, The Frost Place, Rattle, and the Asian American Literary Review, Eugenia received her MFA from Sarah Lawrence College and lives in Brooklyn, NY.
