​Fugue For Rabbits When The Tundra Turns Pink
by Halee Kirkwood

​Hollow wing of sex you whistle inside me at night
I hiss beneath warmth and I whistle at night
We touch and we touch
We velvet thunder, we a rabbit’s panicked life
There’s a smoke alarm in my heart that whimpers awake
Awaken warmth your hush of roses smolder in me
I waken and fold to parentheses you whisper I whistle my wing
                                   turned to tinder
Whistling to my dear winter cinders build a nest in the rubble
You divine breath from splintering ice
 
We touch and we chill
I whistle velvet I’m whistling still
Smoke alarms in my heart that jolt you awake
Awake in the warmth and awake in the night I rabbit I rise
You rose, my thunder, there’s smoke in my heart
 
I whistle and hiss in the night
We make a rose from the thunder at night
A hollow wing a divining of breath my lunatic drum
Drum of throat hunted drum of tongue                                  
Body a tundra a rabbit too white in the blushing spring
Run quicker you panic you doomed velvet hum
 
You drum on my throat and you drum on my tongue
Love is a rabbit you whisper I whistle you splinter my ice
Alarms waking roses the warmth of the night
We touch and we touch and I fear
 
Hollow wing of sex
Rare mammal of flight
We whisper to warmth and we hiss in the night

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​Halee Kirkwood is a descendant of the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Ojibwe, a MFA candidate at Hamline University, and a mentor for the Minnesota Prison Writing Project. Kirkwood has poetry published or forthcoming in Pinwheel Journal, Grimoire Magazine, Cream City Review, and others. Kirkwood was selected as a 2019 Teaching Fellow for the Desert Nights, Rising Stars Writing Conference at Arizona State University. 

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Winter 2019
"Second Story" by Halee Kirkwood

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