*These poems originally appeared on an older version of our site.*
BY TRISTA EDWARDS
Ant’s Egg as Antidote
Consider, more precisely, the composition
of an ant’s egg. All alabaster, all pearl.
Inside, three castes—male, female, & worker—
but which will harvest all the love?
Each egg pure opioid. Overdose.
Kill-switch. There is a beautiful sac I have so
simply declared yours. I practice hating it
to survive. Even the queen will eat
her own wings as a source of protein.
Her body so available it is not a body.
I have been here. I have ingested more.
& more. Bone & heart,
the viscos of summer, hair, honey
& clay, the toxin of memory.
How quick endorphins fade & from this
tiny egg we fall out of love,
out of each other’s bodies. Here,
look at this hill of sand, as tall as a child—
inside is a kingdom of remedy, a lysis,
an antidote, a cure. Winger-eaters we become,
high on the pupae of past love. Let us
forget, let us survive, let us dine.
Boy Beaten with an Elder Stick
The most painful state of being is remembering the future, particularly the one you’ll never have.
-Søren Kierkegaard
We are stunted by our own ghosting.
The damage is not what happens
but the residue of happening. Most are not aware.
Once, an old woman leaned in,
smelling of anise & wet dog,
to say—cut a piece of elder on which the sun
has never shone & between two knots
hang it about the neck as cure
for St. Anthony’s fire. For falling sickness—
cut a twig into nine parts & each night
burrow one in the hallow of your cheek
while you sleep. But what of the boy?
The boy who never grows? His height prevented
in the untold story of his growing—
unstorying, forever-reaching, beating.
***Both poems borrow modified text and titles from Tell the Bees…Belief, Knowledge & Hypersymbolic Cognation distributed by The Museum of Jurassic Technology.
Trista Edwards is an associate editor at Luna Luna Magazine. She is also the curator and editor of the anthology, Till The Tide: An Anthology of Mermaid Poetry (Sundress Publications, 2015). You can read her poems at 32 Poems, Quail Bell Magazine, Moonchild Magazine, The Adroit Journal, The Boiler, Queen Mob's Tea House, Bad Pony, Occulum, and more. She creates magickal candles at her company, Marvel + Moon.