The paper this is written on holds
experiences. You never think
to ask. The trees, the centuries,
the violence. Ripping and bleach. Slaves
and workers who don’t know ease.
Flipping ocean waves and seeping petrol.
White and cleansed with poetry
so tidy and ordered the world
could never be raw.
All paper is mute, only crackling in hand,
the way of bowing pulp pines smacked
by atmosphere. The ink lets through
certain stories and some news.
And under our objects, pretty paper,
plastic and cotton, work slaves
we don’t see.
Previously published in Five:2:One Magazine.
Illustration: “The Road to Dividends,” artist unknown.
Wren Tuatha (Califragile Editor). Wren’s poetry has appeared or is upcoming in The Cafe Review, Canary, Poetry Pacific, Peacock Journal, Coachella Review, Arsenic Lobster, Baltimore Review, Pirene’s Fountain, Loch Raven Review, Clover, Lavender Review, Autumn Sky Poetry Daily, and Bangalore Review. She’s also an editor at PoetryCircle.com. Wren and her partner, author/activist C.T. Lawrence Butler, herd skeptical goats on a mountain in California.
califragile.org 