Monika Herceg

The inevitability of the day rolls down
the sweaty back into a poem
like a pushchair
filled with Venuses’ sulfur and gloom
Perhaps the sky might open up once
the eve’s navel
sneezes into our supper
so the horde of aliens storm in
reeking of rotten eggs
And god,
someone’s fervid resigned god
who only writes down anecdotes
of how we push with a mascara the guilt
of beating the kids,
of beating the dogs,
of throwing away the newborn kittens
to the tip of our lashes

We’re about to suffocate in a poisonous jar
if no one was soon to figure out how to cut the chimneys
It will be a sultry summer afternoon
resembling the day I first got beaten up
Louder than the jets the flies feasted on the pieces of the sky

Dogs may not, but children remember everything
They remember your frowns,
remember each point where
the whip and the body met
And deeper,
and deeper
through the layers of clothes

Summertime is the hardest
since there’s nowhere to turn
but to one’s naked self