I am not the brain in the mouth, she whispered so quietly she could barely feel her lips utter lullabies to her small daughter drifting into sleep underneath a mound of blankets. I am not to utter, to understand, to wetware an existence. To hold the fingertips carefully. The children carefully rubbed blood from puddles beside them so they could play dead, maybe could avoid being shot at too. We are not the gun on a body worn like a dress. A rifle in the eyes of the mouth I cannot know. Of a life in front of the little ones reciting appreciations and concerns. I am not the only son holding his first certificate. I am not the robin with the stick in her mouth batting against a car’s window. The figures in the painting at the art opening are all about the self. Dickinson said the brain was even bigger than the sky because of what it can hold. What can you wring out then, container of something you try to know, telegraph, water clock, computer. I will walk on the ground and touch and fall. I am not the daughter without a worry keep her like that do not keep her like that.
Emily Koehn lives in St. Louis, Missouri, and teaches at Washington University and the St. Louis Poetry Center. Her poems have appeared in numerous journals including the Colorado Review, Cincinnati Review, Conduit, Waxwing, and The Journal.
