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l.a.
Erica Woiwode received her Master's in Literature & Writing Studies from Cal State University, San Marcos. She currently teaches English at Palomar College and Mount San Jacinto College. Her poetry has been published in Academic Exchange Extra for four consecutive months, L.A. Miscellany (Los Angeles), The Poetry Conspiracy (San Diego), artistic rights and the Cal State San Marcos Pride Literary Supplement. She was featured in the Summer 2004 issue of Turbula.
By Erica Woiwode
it's dark in this town,
where the greed
flakes off rude
buildings in chunks,
and the stench
of the pavement
drives the souls
of birds out
of their bodies –
where wooded angels of holly
eat up ambition,
for breakfast, lunch, dinner,
chewing it sticky,
crying for more –
where the cars seethe by
like mechanical lemmings,
as their fumes intoxicate
lungs with a ransom –
and every stoplight,
forgetting politeness,
denouncing all sentiment, yells,
BANG!
and before very long
the story turns sour
and people begin to lick
the words from the bottom –
and while the city wheezes
and slithers its way
through a capitalist wet dream,
high above the botox
of the rhinoplastic playground –
the moon is breaking off in great chunks –
Published July 2005
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