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Christina Cook: Doing the Dishes

August 24, 2017 by PBQ Leave a Comment

I beget the continental drift
of dish soap down the drain,
tectonic shift of plates, planetary
in the sense of belonging
as everything belongs
to the earth’s innermost
sodden crust. Suds assemble
into large masses of land.
Hemispheres appear
to rise up from the rinds
of the evening meal.
The planet implodes
in the garbage disposal,
but will make itself anew
by morning. I hold my hand
over the disposal’s mouth,
tempted, as all women have been
since
we know blood
like our own hands,
and mine, here so held,
fears not, but flips the switch
off, content tonight to wash
the knives. The household
is comforted by my nightly clatter
and the world,
in its insatiable hunger,
turns away.

Filed Under: Contributors 96, Issue 96, Poetry, Poetry 96 Tagged With: Christina Cook, contributors 96, issue 96, Poetry, poetry 96

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