Tuesday, March 3, 2015

A.J. Huffman- Three Poems


I Am Submersion

an entity entirely consumed
by my surroundings.  I am not breathing,
but drowning, slowly, and in increments
too small to be perceived from land.
I am silent suicide, incapable of single stroke
directed towards shore.  I am wave,
crashing inside myself, violently,
waiting for residual
calm.


The Road to Shark Road

Unprecedented footpath provides
prehistoric passage, a burning
vision of saline and saliva.  A wash
of unnecessary breath, a triumphless
trail of bubbles leading
nowhere.  Forgotten
in a flash of teeth, scent of wound, fire
flaring in deprivating depths.
Instincts drive body beyond safety
barriers.  Breach!  Internal warning
screams, ignored.  Focus re-falls,
a clever cleaver, right
                                    through the heart
of the only destiny worth the hunt.  Eyes
blank, ass primed, mobile
machination meets baited death.


Bribing Starving Souls

A church down the street is advertising.
First-time attendees get a $50 gift card
to local restaurant, and I wonder
at the logic of this incentive.  Force-feeding
religion to the opportunistic seems counter-
productive to the cause.  Would that money not be
better spent on soup-kitchen meals
for the homeless?  I watch the following Sunday
as a packed parking lot purges a parade
of worshippers in full finery, each hand out
not in introduction, but in acceptance
of payoff.  Their bodies move forward to fill
pews, but their minds have already wandered
to thoughts of potential
desserts.



A.J. Huffman has published eleven solo chapbooks and one joint chapbook through various small presses. Her new poetry collection, Another Blood Jet, is now available from Eldritch Press. She has three more poetry collections forthcoming: A Few Bullets Short of Home from mgv2>publishing, Degeneration from Pink Girl Ink, and A Bizarre Burning of Bees from Transcendent Zero Press. She is a Multiple Pushcart Prize nominee, and has published over 2100 poems in various national and international journals, including Labletter, The James Dickey Review, Bone Orchard, EgoPHobia, and Kritya. She is also the founding editor of Kind of a Hurricane Press. www.kindofahurricanepress.com

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