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Jeanne Morel

Crawl City

Logic

Crawl City

When you are obsessed
is no time         for pleasantries           

the television of all night
convenience shops  

a monitor monitoring our every move
            above the cash register  

while rats race labyrinths       
/ in the space between

your hairline and your fine plucked
brows

            My friend said once & it’s true— when you go
            to a country that’s been devastated,

the people
/ are laughing  

heads back
mouths open—no teeth

This is the opposite
of obsession   

this letting go
                        / Remember the pepper-

mint/s  in plastic wrap,
the metal toothpick

bin that plopped
a wooden stick down

when you turned the small
round knob    / a little

girl at Denny’s?

            Where  are our parents  
now   long gone  

no use for toothpicks

in this country  /or another
when you get there

look around   / &
            check for laughter

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Logic

            . . . .  to engage roses /becomes a geometry
                                    —William Carlos Williams
                                     
the rose ends and geometry
begins

—other poems come through the blank paper but not this

            to engage the breathless stagger
on the backstairs         the evangelist’s assistant withholds information

who knew

the scent of yellow roses in the kitchen window overpowers the odor
/ of fish in the trash—

really—?

            who has missed what / completely—

her fork trembles & she makes tentative stabs at the cauliflower
/ the notion of the theorem is deeply intertwined with the concept of proof

            who knew the arithmetic of autumn
            / dry twigs & berries

could conjure mornings           / immersion    

            an unexpected gathering of Hungarian numbers  

a space to step into

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Jeanne Morel is the author of the chapbook That Crossing Is Not Automatic. (Tarpaulin Sky). Recent poems have appeared in december magazine and Fourteen Hills. She lives in Seattle with her husband and their two cats and teaches poetry, composition, and Adult Basic Education. She has an MFA in Writing from Pacific University.

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