Jake Sheff
America, what's in your mouth?
Cover Art: Bruce Nauman, "Study for Hologram," 1979. Screen print, SFMOMA
America, what's in your mouth?
Spit it out. A speech to shade the ocean’s
hand? A river drunk on minutes’ pebbles? Spit it out. What are you hiding? Spit the bells out; ground up chimes for prairie meals. Sweep the fire off your tongue, sweep the fire from its flame. Mop the broom and mail your name to canvas. Spit it out and cook it on the clock-face. Spit out winter on a hot plate, spit out summer on a sleigh. Swallow nothing like today. |
Jake Sheff is a major and pediatrician in the US Air Force, married with a daughter and three pets. Currently home is the Mojave Desert. Poems of Jake’s are in Radius, The Ekphrastic Review, The Brooklyn Review, The Cossack Review and elsewhere. He won 1st place in the 2017 SFPA speculative poetry contest and was a finalist in the Rondeau Roundup’s 2017 triolet contest. His chapbook is “Looting Versailles” (Alabaster Leaves Publishing).
past, Terri Muuss next, Molly Day