by Christopher Phelps
Since gorgeous is at heart a word, incomplete as any storied origin
(likely connected to necklace, from an old French root for throat),
it can be partially a choice, how one appears
in one’s own skin.
I would like to live
wherever it’s uncontroversial to be oneself,
put together however it happened
that one became this version of each pleach
of cells and selves, by whatever righteous, unrightable
blend of accident and necessity, with no man
who can hardly speak himself
speaking for us, whatever the reservoirs of cause
and missed claws, the happy heavy hiding
nervous mammal who is me, scratching or embracing
multicursal, multiversal arms,
or just you, as you are today, looking alive
as any password turned impasseward, turning over
so many times, the worn warm lift and burn,
crash and land of
lucky coin sides coincide.
Christopher Phelps lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he tutors himself and others in math and related mysteries. He is queer and neuroqueer, a twainbow that underwrites his attempts at creative solvency and steadfascination. His poems have appeared in journals including Anti-Heroin Chic, Beloit Poetry Journal, The Nation, Poetry, and RHINO. A chapbook, Tremblem, exists as a secret item. Find more at www.christopher-phelps.com.
Emerge Literary Journal 