ATLien Breathes in the Symphony at Piedmont Park
So this is what it feels like the world breathing out Harmony
a long way off & somehow everywhere all at once sprawling
across a hill so green you’d think it was spraypainted Striped
beach towels & peach tapestries thronging w/variegated people
An ancient grove of oak trees & swaying maples shading the lawn
There is much beauty scored here live in the air Sour Diesel
& food truck smoke layered over Tchaikovsky’s “Love Theme”
A happy black toddler bobbles an oversized Braves cap &
sunglasses while the clarinets & string section rev themselves
into a major key Violins take flight The park soars as he hurtles
towards a woman’s open arms i see it when a beagle tackles him
w/ kisses breaks his fall sweeter than a plate of yams
w/ extra syrup: Everything around me is unstable except beauty
peace vibes & wonderment This ambrosia i invent & conduct
Surely, you must have thought about destroying us at some point, no?
back on Stankonia / the streets are lined w/ purple / feathered hedges / scissored into floppy afros / that sway like limber hips / in a haze-induced wine /
at night / electrified axes excavate ennui / & when the wind cries / we tilt back / our mouths / to the rain / photosynthesize blues into funk / exalt it / into microphones & hi-fi speakers / catalyzing joy / out of void / which is our essence / essence we’ve streamed into Hammond organs / & children of the Matriarch / essence we’ve moonwalked / 6-step & windmilled back / into atmosphere / as morning / sampled-
loops / that steer the Mothership / pollinate the hedges / keep the wheelz of steel turning / so to speak / provided we keep the beat / & a SpottieOttieDopaliscious frequency /
i think you’ll agree / annihilation runs counter to immortality / but i am learning
§
if my brief study of weekend lie-ins / holidays / paid sick time & vape breaks / have taught me anything / the surest form of destruction is self- / inflicted / which is viral / if not communicable /
we see you not / as the enemy / more like a midsized star- / striped bagpipe / wheezing carbon / [Sorry Ms. Jackson] that was unkind / excuse this cautious / distance disguised as frankness / lately Twitter’s been chafing at my empathy / as i understand it / once desire hooks its angler barb thru the wet side of your cheek / you can’t tourniquet the ache w/ a Band-Aid / case & point:
it provides approximately / zero sustenance / but i’ve been known to fuck up / a Popeyes chicken sandwich in a parking lot / reclined behind a sky-blue dumpster / at Stankonia Studios / the vainglorious fried buttermilk & cayenne combo / calls to me / even now / as i feel my hollow / stomach groan / descend / two inches over my denim waistband / against a plastic armrest that doubles as an iPad screen /
i photoshop the mushy face of E.T. / onto Chef Boyardee’s body / Tweet: Cooking up fat beats for the low! / marketing scheme earns two reposts / & seven measly hearts / in social currency / i sip a Caramel Macchiato about it / leave work early / ask Amazon to send baggy hoodies / binge Love & Hip Hop Atlanta / until the informercial hour ends / in three easy payments of $49.99 / so now i own a souped-up Ferrari / Cold Press Juicer / but not enough / loot to last me
i have come to see / only commercial pleasure erodes the lifeforce / it was meant to comfort / a vampiric empirical finding / [given the availability of Coca-Cola / Crypto / & high interest credit / by the click] / which obliterates supply chains / makes the makers / richer / hungrier / destroyers / w/o meaning to be / so tell me:
why would we bloodlet Earth / disconnect humans / from their compromised Wi-Fi networks / when the real virus / greed / the biological trojan horse / that has occupied it since the dawn of mankind / was invented there?
MARCUS WICKER is the author of Silencer (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2017)—winner of the Society of Midland Authors Award—and Maybe the Saddest Thing (Harper Perennial, 2012), selected by D.A. Powell for the National Poetry Series. A 2023-2024 Harvard Radcliffe Institute Fellow, his honors include a National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellowship, the Poetry Society of America’s Lyric Poetry Award, a Pushcart Prize, and Ruth Lilly Fellowship, as well as fellowships from The Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, and Cave Canem. Wicker’s poems have appeared in The Nation, The New Republic, The Atlantic, Oxford American, and Poetry Magazine. He is an Associate Professor at the University of Memphis, where he teaches in the MFA program.