An interconnected family of supernovas burning bright in the night sky: take a moment, reach out—join us.
I Am Rage
Ashley Sapp
The world goes down slow,
a gentle submersion.
Come alive,
it says to the wildlife hiding
beneath the longleaf pines,
branches signaling peace
against a solemn dark. Here
comes the raccoon, squealing.
He approaches me and my
dog, stops short on sight,
and the world pauses in
that moment of question.
The blindness you feel is
no accident. As though
he senses my curiosity,
he scatters as quickly as he
came, leaving me to wonder
like the human I am.
To leap into this moment
is to abandon the last, humanity
in transition within our sights.
I am taught about losing
through evolution; what is left is
the ellipsis of pausing: between.
And with a macchiato mouth,
I kiss my lover as though
he can revive me, feed me
his lifesaving breath, so I swallow—
the world easing on its haunches
unhurried. This is what
it is to not worry anymore.
This is what it is to not hurt
anymore. At 1:00am
in mid-February, I have
discovered my own savagery
and feel beneath the sheets.
My body has morphed
into one I can now touch,
a guide of nature’s moods.
Yes, the world goes down
slow because it knows the
people it takes to catastrophe.
I suppose I do, too.
Come alive, I speak into
existence as the earth wakes.
Here comes my body,
lurching. It has known
violence, but I am rage
and the world will not
survive me. And so
I weep. So I sleep.
About the Author
Ashley Sapp (she/her) resides in Columbia, South Carolina, with her dog, Barkley. She earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from the University of South Carolina in 2010, and her work has previously appeared in Indie Chick, Variant Lit, Emerge Literary Journal, Common Ground Review, and elsewhere. Ashley has written two poetry collections: Wild Becomes You and Silence Is A Ballad. She can be found on Twitter @ashthesapp and Instagram @ashsappley.