Stephen Pollock
bulb
my portrait
disfiguring canvas
in its attic of vertebrae
see how the frame
depends on cord
and oils
the oils
ooze out of nerves
as if from collapsing tubes
ocher for ulcer
puce for boil
caput mortuum
for whatever remains
the deepest stratum
fibers writhing in a gesso sea
my erstwhile crimes
those damaged lives
now scars etched with palette knives
archive the carnage
to settle accounts
no doubt the picture’s hidden
but wheelchair
diaper
refute the fiction
of perfect beauty
perpetual youth
slashing the canvas is moot
***
Stephen Pollock received the Rolfe Humphries Poetry Prize in his senior year at Amherst College. His poem “Syringe” was shortlisted for the 2018 Live Canon International Poetry Prize, and his elegy “Leaves” was a semifinalist for the 2019 River Styx International Poetry Contest. “Arachnidæa: Line Drawings” was awarded second place in the Poet’s Choice category of the Oregon Poetry Association’s 2020 competition. Steve’s poems have appeared in Poeming Pigeon, Live Canon Anthology, Ink to Paper, Buddhist Poetry Review and Pinesong.