Michelle Matthees
Poetry
Michelle Matthees’ poems have appeared in Memorious, PANK, The Prose Poem Project, and numerous other journals. Her first collection, Flucht, will be published by New Rivers Press in October of 2016. A graduate of the University of Minnesota MFA Program in Creative Writing, she currently lives in Duluth, Minnesota. More information about her work is available at michellematthees.com
Homemade
Up with the dawn, down with the boat,
remaking each waking with work,
the purr of the motor, its small black cat
that sees in the dark. You
are careful with the oars and their locks
rowing from the dock before the rip cord
pulls its punch into the night.
Up the river we putter, plastic ducks
in burlap at our feet, relatives,
each with its own lead weight wrapped
around its neck. We unbend each shackle
in silence and toss them into
their own dark faces strafed with stars.
They bob a trail, the truth of a family
fooling for food,
and we take up our guns, plunk
the homemade green shells in,
snap the jaws shut, waiting
as if I weren’t a girl learning to kill,
frozen hands locking
up as the sun meets the moon of frost
flaking off your jacket
before the puff of feathers
and the blood on our different hands.
remaking each waking with work,
the purr of the motor, its small black cat
that sees in the dark. You
are careful with the oars and their locks
rowing from the dock before the rip cord
pulls its punch into the night.
Up the river we putter, plastic ducks
in burlap at our feet, relatives,
each with its own lead weight wrapped
around its neck. We unbend each shackle
in silence and toss them into
their own dark faces strafed with stars.
They bob a trail, the truth of a family
fooling for food,
and we take up our guns, plunk
the homemade green shells in,
snap the jaws shut, waiting
as if I weren’t a girl learning to kill,
frozen hands locking
up as the sun meets the moon of frost
flaking off your jacket
before the puff of feathers
and the blood on our different hands.