VINYL POETRY

Volume 5, March 2012

BIRDIE
Nate MarshallView Contributor’s Note

Rahm’s first word

I imagine he was wearing tights
his body taut
bent around the bar on the mirrored wall
like a guitar string in mid-pluck

his luck slipped on
the sweat of another
dancer in the studio

his slipper slid left
like an election cycle
the joint buckled under
the weight of puberty

(an awkward that even
the calculating body control
of a budding cavalier
can not always avoid)

the leg gave way
broken seesawed to ground
and then it came:

damn
shit
fuck
rahm


the sound stopped everything
the teacher’s appraising eyes
gaggle of giggling girls
levitating in pointe shoes
they all became static

four
the number of letters
a single syllable shout
a trumpet bleating, declaring

i am here now
get used to me
i am plotting loudly
how to fill the air.