PRATIK LA ISSUE SPECIAL : ALICE PERO's "The Parts"

 

ALICE PERO

The Parts

 

Sticky fingers, sticky-icky time, like molasses, sticking us

Or not sticking, sliding, not knowing who or how

just slipping along, no control and we flop

our ski legs floundering

then our ice cracking and falling into pieces again

 

No point in pointing fingers, no one knows why

these are places we go or who we are

We aren’t in place

Just placed

 

There are plenty of dogs who would tear us apart

if ever they found us

down that long corridor of history

and when we became meat in all its various parts

the dogs loved all the parts, the flesh, the parts that cry and moan

the gluey sinews, the wing bones, the toes

 

But then we break away again

and we just sing, we sing

and those notes hold

We are outside skin

We are whole

 

Alice Pero’s first book, Thawed Stars, was praised by Kenneth Koch as having “clarity and surprises.” Her poems have recently been published in the anthologies, Wide Awake: Poets of Los Angeles and Beyond, Coiled Serpent, and Altadena Poetry Review. She is founder of the reading series “Moonday” and the chamber music group, “Windsong.” She is a dedicated dialoguer with poets around the country, having produced work with over 20 poets. 

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