Peanut
First came the itch, then hives, her nose doubling, tongue swelling, throat blocked like a tunnel suddenly filled with water. What a long road from flower to factory to the medics rushing in with syringes, oxygen, strapping down that body I forged in mine, months sleepwalking through the universal design and all its possibilities for error. Where I find nutrients, her cells sense contagion, commence a nuclear option, a misunderstanding spiraling, where everyone is as innocent as they are guilty. Published in Southern Poetry Review |