Archive
Unenforceable Promise
by Julia Martin
The party of the first part
to this most personal service contract —
departed
Scratch that clause
on successors and assigns
Our vow to love forever?
Void ab initio
per the statute of frauds
Not to impugn or imply
a deceptive intent
The existence of mutual mistake
— a flaw in formation —
is not material
yet loop-de-loops
through my head
A closed track clacks and shuttles
an infinitely regressive plea
v. renvoi
Julia Martin is a lapsed lawyer who now battles the apocalypse by bringing new books and pleasure reading to low-income children in the Chicago area. She blogs at Clumps and Voids.
Extinction
You were the only member:
not quite domain, a hungry sect
my species. Now, a lone
attenuated form
vestigial remnant
like gar in flooded quarry pit
or possum, wire-hanger tail
and anxious crunch of kit’s
dry meal from set-out pail—
how must I mourn?
My problems are too many teeth:
they seem unduly dull
Or vegetation’s plot, perhaps—
a shift in serration
evading failure’s dentation,
the way the world mutates
beyond peripheries of sight
Do I adapt?
If so, what tune
should I now whistle—
at crepuscule, noon—
through what constructed beak
and — Lord — to whom?
by Julia Martin
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qarrtsiluni 