from “Green Knife”

Excerpt
Written By Stella Corso

Stella Corso | Green Knife | Rescue Press | October 2023 | 118 Pages

How pitiful to be human

you’re almost made
to become a monster

riding the train at peak hour
or in a lover’s bed

one of a couple or one of a few
where some warm and decorated

body has already been
made to feel more alive

by proximity, a stranger
will press their countenance

into yours without permission
without care or precaution

which you can either accept or resist
but you cannot stop

gravity, the moon
is the only constant

the moon does not need
our consent

The men drink the water
of your kitchen

the flavors are endless
which colors the suffering




Men drink the colors
and are nourished

I nourish myself from the cloud
I order things from

a new blue bra
a set of four Ball jars
also blue
and wide mouthed

that feeling
I can give myself

anytime I want




From Green Knife by Stella Corso. 
Copyright © 2023 Stella Corso. 
Reprinted with permission of Rescue Press.

Stella Corso

Stella Corso is the author of Green Knife (Rescue Press, 2023) and TANTRUM (Rescue Press, 2017), selected by Douglas Kearney for the 2016 Black Box Poetry Prize. She is also the author of the chapbooks Taboo Vivant (Blush Lit, 2022) and Wind & the Augur (Sixth Finch, 2021), and a founding member of the Connecticut River Valley Poets Theater (CRVPT).

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