THANK YOU, a poem based on a rejection letter from a literary journal

I was rejected by a poetry journal & found the language of their letter kind of amazing & so I wrote a poem based on it. The poem will appear in a forthcoming book THE MOST CHARMING CREATURES (Fall 2022, ECW Press)

THANK YOU

 

 

We are unable to accept 

these poems 

 

We are on fire and possibly

infected. The Poetry Editorial Board responded 

 

strongly, admiring your craft and total rage

but disagreed about how to extinguish

 

fire or end infection.

Eat the rich. 

 

They’re not infected. The poems struck 

like bowling balls in a flu

 

knocking readers down.

We coughed. Our flesh burned. 

Yet our eyes are the same old eyes. 

Other readers may respond 

 

differently if they’re in quarantine

or underwater.

 

Maybe in time 

the poems will find good homes 

 

far from shrieking coastlines. 

We hear the shrink of birds

 

forests denuding foxes. Our offices have returned

to nature. Moss grows on our managing 

 

editor. Our tweed unravels 

an economy of entropy.

 

Like trees our inbox 

warps time.

 

And like time, our out boxes 

are on fire and like your blood

 

you should certainly keep 

these poems in circulation.

 

This is the way the world ends

Not with a bang but 

while we watch.