ANGER AGENT (SCORPIO SUN)

Pulled from dark stars. Armored
luck, hot with breath.

My first planet is a heartbeat; my second
is dimmer and of the dead.

My attachment to the world is a knife floating
above my forehead and it’s how I make my way.

Dramatic taproot! I am my own rider and this knife
points only at my mouth; you couldn’t catch it.

However we originate, no matter the sky,
we are all fierce until we are not:

in dreams I shimmer
and am small.

ABSORBER (PISCES MOON)

Dreamed up by melting orbs. Scaly
assurance, shy and weepy with regret.

I take to my ice giant to forget. I am last in a loop—
a band no tine could puncture or divvy.

My attachment to the world is a crepe-paper
lantern over the sea: it cannot allure forever.

I am covered by the universe and I give
unto the universe. This concert of light pricks the eyes.

I melt. The lantern won’t resurface. You’ll see—after more
centuries, I will go beyond the farthest beyond.

Alone, I build fortresses
from fins, scales.

Devan Murphy is the author of the chapbook I'm Not I'm Not I'm Not a Baby (Ethel 2024), a collection of prose poems and essays and abstract comics about God and loneliness. Her writing and illustrations have appeared or are forthcoming in Electric Literature, The Cincinnati Review, -ette, The Iowa Review, Gigantic Sequins, and elsewhere. You can find her online at devmurphy.club or on Instagram @gytrashh. She resides in Pittsburgh with her cat, Buddy, where she writes wikiHow articles and personality quizzes for a living.