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Mathew Yates

articulate your bones

in the green of deep spring
i used to walk the railroad tracks
couched in steep woods
along the northern reaches
 
of the Tennessee River,
called the Cherokee
or Tanasi or Hogohegee,
called the Callamaco,
 
& i would lose count of the bones
of little creatures i’d encounter,
killed sometime last year,
or maybe a decade ago,
 
& cleaned of flesh
by the violent world,
& i would miss them terribly.
 
so i would attempt,
with eight-year-old fingers,
to reassemble the dead
& brittle little souls right
 
in the place that i found them.
being an initiate, i would crudely recreate
their skeletons: raccoons, red foxes,
opossums, rabbits, robins,
a little lost kitten –
 
& i would imagine their sinews
moving in my image,
shaking a fist at the trains
we heard coming & going,
 
& we’d wonder who could
run those things through this place
& how this place would look in real life
& i’d trick myself apart from fault
& wonder at my grace in
recognizing stolen beauty

Biography

Picture
​Mathew Yates (they/them) is a poet & artist from Paducah, Kentucky. Their poetry can be found in Barren Magazine, Epigraph Magazine, marlskarx, Memoir Mixtapes, & more. Their illustrations can also be found in the recent full-length release, Flutter, by Kristin Garth, published by Twist in Time Press. (@m_yates)
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ISSN 2639-426X
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  • Home
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  • Issues
    • Issue 49
    • Issue 48
    • Issue 47
    • Issue 46
    • Issue 45
    • Issue 44
    • Issue 43
    • Issue 42
    • Issue 41
    • Issue 40
    • Issue 39
    • Issue 38
    • Issue 37
    • Issue 36
    • Issue 35
    • Issue 34
    • Issue 33
    • Issue 32
    • Issue 31
    • Issue 30
    • Issue 29
    • Issue 28
    • Issue 27
    • Issue 26
    • Issue 25
    • Issue 24
    • Issue 23
    • Issue 22
    • Issue 21
    • Issue 20
    • Issue 19
    • Issue 18
    • Serenity
    • Issue 17
    • The Audio Room
    • Issue 16
    • Issue 15
    • Issue 14
    • Play It Again
    • Issue 13
    • Issue 12
    • Issue 11
    • Issue 10
    • Issue 9
    • Issue 8
    • Issue 7
    • Issue 6
    • Hand to Mouth
    • Issue 5
    • Issue 4
    • Issue 3
    • Issue 2
    • Issue 1
  • Submissions