Zachary Dankert, Indianapolis, Indiana, USA
“Extinct,” at the time, was not
in my vocabulary (“Exodus,”
“Paradise,” and “Parable”
were close, rising cruxed
out of the Pelagic.) I was
a child, and words
like this create their own puncture,
become known by the whistle of
escaping air like a kettle. But
I didn’t believe there were pink dolphins
in rivers, even when people spoke
of God as if he was fleshed
under the current. Names are poetic,
which means names are useless;
Saint Helena swamphen, Pyrenean
Ibex, Splendid Poison Frog and
Spined Dwarf Mantis. How could I
have been so foolish, thinking stars
were species pilgrimed
stretched end to end to the next
universe over? What became of
Christ in me? My child-
hood bedroom was angles and
window panes trapping night
to identify under a microscope,
in one cell of horizon I found
water from the Yangtze River and
glare from Philippine skies and
I swallowed it all for myself, retching
it up in the morning. I was afraid
to ask my mother, what she might say
about a bellyful of wrongdoings.
It is a wonder how much can become
currency, teeth in the wrist, golden
bull men in the eyes,
but there was a time when I was a
fiddlehead fern craning over
the garden bed, sniffing in all
the muck.
Day filling the breath between
liturgies, another useless gesture.
And I’m maddened by
prayer, which is always an act of
the faithless; at night I pray
to the god who was spared then
sacrificed by Abraham, yet
there are numerous stars in the sky.
My last act of childhood was
to watch out my window
the Basilica carved out of
retreating twilight plop over
the edge of the world.
Cyprus Dipper, Caspian Tiger.
Now I am prostrate before
Epochs, and stare only
at the ground.
Zachary Dankert is an aspiring creator living on unceded Miami territory known as Indianapolis, Indiana. His published work can be found in The Fourth River, Breakbread Literary Magazine, and Tofu Ink Arts Press, and is forthcoming in West Trade Review.
