in my fox suit
no one knows why I am red
it’s just understood
I am cloaking my color
at the very moment you
scan the field for a flicker
two birches like the moon’s open veins
this is silver half of shadow
behind me the forest is
a green that’s letting go
inside my body nothing is growing
my bronze skeleton is thrumming
I have rearranged myself constantly
to be a prism
I am glimpse in your double take
I love you crazy from my dart away
with my cunning which is
the kind that seems misinformed
so that when I meet a fox in human skin
he will say hello empty animal
I will say yes to false yes to poor tailoring
and from my mouth the devil will
bright his eyes and leap away bushytailed
I want to build a house
where only an ant can find me
ants have nothing
but pragmatic
hivemindy things to say:
more tunnels more soil
go in every direction
dead is everywhere
we are ant for we are many
hard water in the ground
carry the drink
prince of wings
queen of child
doors stairs skylights
I am nothing
use my body as a bridge
Alexander Scalfano is a second year MFA candidate at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and comes from Alabama.
At UMass, he also works as the Distributions Editor for Slope Editions. His poems appear in H_NGM_N and Smoking Glue Gun.