Foundry
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my cousins dare me to eat an entire large pizza

San Genaro Italian Restaurant, 1994

​If a distant star
were watching through
a telescope, it would not
understand any of this--
the glee with which the cousins
stare as the boy puts his body
to its practical use, the cruel
& bewildering medicine
shame & joy make, how
the boy belongs by not
belonging, how he enters
into community by way
of performing what separates
him from it, how, once learned,
this will save him from quick
small deaths by killing him
slowly & all the way. It would
not understand the alchemy
this is, a transformation
of nourishment into devastation
which creates, somehow,
another nourishment,
it would not understand
the covenant the boy is
making with a divine
imposter, a minor god
in the mask of heaven,
it would understand only
this: an expanding body taking
& taking, until nothing, not
even light, will touch it.
Picture
"Star-forming Complex 30 Doradus from the Hubble Space Telescope" by HubbleColor {Zolt} is marked with CC PDM 1.0

Jeremy Radin is a poet, actor, teacher, and extremely amateur gardener. His poems have appeared (or are forthcoming) in Ploughshares, The Colorado Review, Crazyhorse, Gulf Coast, The Journal, and elsewhere. He is the author of two collections of poetry: Slow Dance with Sasquatch (Write Bloody Publishing, 2012) and Dear Sal (not a cult press, 2017). He was born and lives in Los Angeles. Follow him @germyradin.
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