7/12/2020 POETRY: JESSICA LEGAPING AT THE GROUND WITH THE WINDOW OPEN we are driving up the side of a mountain when we run into a lone black cow. she stands with her knees jutting out of her flesh, black hide strained bursting, wild stitch holding together cloudy blood and burnt milk. you park the car, cutting the ignition, tumbling out. the air is black exhaust wisping away, feels dry and flat, cool against the raw wet of your underarms. the cow lowers its head. and this is the land of the future, here, the scraped dry red of the earth, tufts of grass shuddering in the wind. we walk past metal birds dipping low into the earth, drawing out oil thicker than blood, black as anything. watch the clouds yellowing against the sky, dimming where they meet smoke, joining hands only to unjoin them. watch the sun split itself open like a red, red plum, sharp against the thickening sky. watch bugs claw their way out of the cracks in the dirt, the way they swarm the nearest sweetest thing. making our way back to the highway we stop by the side of a small stream and plunge our hands into it, steal plums from a nearby tree and sink our teeth into them. juice bleeds down your chin, and we wash the red off our hands and watch it pool at the end of the water, the red earth clouding into black exhaust, then wisping away. the cow lowers its head. Jessica Le is currently an undergrad business student at Western University. Her poetry has been published in Western University's Symposium Anthology, CSC's Alt Mag, and is forthcoming in 愈, healing Magazine. She lives in Ottawa.
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