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 & CommentaryConduitColumbia Poetry ReviewBlack Warrior ReviewRhino, Tammy, and elsewhere. She lives and works in New York.

 

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