D M Gordon
editor, writer, and poet; author of two novels, a memoir, and two poetry collections; former editor at Hedgerow Books; finalist for the Massachusetts Book Award, International Book Award, and the Pablo Neruda Award from Nimrod; winner of Glimmer Train’s First Prize, the Betsy Colquitt Award from descant, the Editor’s Choice Award from The Beacon Street Review; her work has appeared in The Massachusetts Review, Weber Studies, The Northwest Review, and Poetry Daily
Protest
Water, heating, is a different beast, a roar
unlike woodland streams–unmusical, a galaxy
of molecules brought to boil, screaming
tiny lobsters (I imagine). We’ve recorded,
and now can testify, microbes twit like finches in alarm,
so why not the H’s and the O’s when forced
to be steam? Even single-celled planktons
broadcast their distress, command their soldiers
to raise chalk shields, while others of their kind
kill themselves not to host a viral invasion.
And so, making tea, I’m listening to electrons
scrabbling at this steel wall, crying out throatlessly,
clinging, doing all they can to stay the way they are.
Like little me’s. Like my life. Heating up.
© DM Gordon, as published in Cider Press Review, Vol. 19, Issue 4