JURASSIC
MEGHAN M. LEE
JURASSIC
date palms and their jagged shadows
black black rock tumbling out of rock, suspended
the Pacific: its coldness is Jurassic, its salt
California = white pepper eucalyptus
falling in love or loving better
which has nothing to do with this state
of green pandemonium, the pebbled plate of figs
precious, natural, artificial
no one told me how cold it would be
or how much like the Piazzoni murals, every sunset
flat and beautiful and flat and beautiful, chalky cold with pastels
the bread is so good we can’t stop eating it
one evening we saw a man catching the big hard shelled crabs
with a stick and his hands – he was balanced carefully on the rocks
it’s legal or illegal, no one cares
the homeless men and women are sleeping on rainbows
on the street – not a metaphor –
Lamborghini, Tesla, Maserati, Ducati
they eat them up they eat them all up
lands there are to the west of west where the BOOM
of construction makes me jump
the water trembles in my cup, my cup runneth over
and still it’s not enough
◊
Meghan M. Lee
Meghan M. Lee’s poems have appeared in American Letters & Commentary, Conduit, Columbia Poetry Review, Black Warrior Review, Rhino, Tammy, and elsewhere. She lives and works in New York.
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