BELLADONNA

in the dreams, i am always

level as a goat’s pupil. something

graceful. a figure

skater or ballerina, perfect

in my craft like an uncaught

serial killer. ephemeral evidence

of life runs through me. cold. and i

cannot bleed.

DISSECTION

golden shovel after John Keats

quick as deer or bird from gunshot, the mind fled

the body. black-velvet sleep without dream. is

there pain if flesh doesn’t remember the carving? that

bone can be entered so easily frightens me. do you want music

to drift off to? breathe in. again. yes, Lana Del Rey will do.

last breath like exit wounds. Keats was a surgeon’s apprentice. i

couldn’t bear five years of opening people up when some never wake.

a fifth of his life spent healing with herbs, instruments, yet he chose poetry, or

it chose him. i am twenty-five now, tumors in bloom. body, don’t fail me. just sleep.

Liza Rose is a poet from rural Pennsylvania now living in New York City with her barn-born orange cat, Chai Honey. She received her MFA from NYU’s creative writing program. Her work has been published by, or is forthcoming from, EcoTheo Collective, Academy of American Poets, Mississippi Review, West Trade Review, and Apricity Press, among others. You can find her watching a horror movie or a nature documentary, or at lizarosepoetry.com.