Poets and Poems: Amy Billone’s “The Light Changes”

In Amy Billone’s The Light Changes: Poems, the poet throws herself in front of a train. And lives to tell the story – not exactly what you expect from poets and poems.

Grace

I was raped by a speeding train. I asked it to. 

I threw myself before it. I extended my legs, arms. 

It came when I called it. Oh what enormous

metal thighs. Oh what fast thudding hips. Again

again against my blackening eyes, skull, chest, waist—

I loved its greasy sighs. I loved its wild blows. 

                                                                                   

My mind flew away. Who pulled me from below? 

Who fed me with a tube? Who brought me

sunflowers? Who hummed me lullabies? Who

pardoned me? Who ripped my shame in two?

To continue reading, please see my post today at Tweetspeak Poetry.

Photograph by Alex Grichenko via Public Domain Pictures. Used with permission.