New Home

By Jan Wiezorek

PROMPT — I will not rest until ...

Trailer, give me my new home,

cuddly, as a furry animal crawling,

digging itself out of a wall, animated

as cockroaches. The impact of an air

vent, with animal crap, as you work

year-round at a farm dairy. It’s a rat’s

nest. A home like stuffed skunk falling

onto your lap. Or, before you sleep

in your bathtub bed on a Michigan dairy

farm forming you, deforming, when I

should have made you visible. None

of us grasp because your hands cannot

grab, even udders, in arm pain, fist

never to retract. How much are you

tucked away, invisible, undocumented,

out of sight, as the start of electrical fire,

until two have died, alarm-free, but don’t

report this, for fear of being sent back,

Mexican, no one sees you, no one looking

here to inspect this place, you, in jeopardy,

peril, ill-protected—as a stuffed animal

that may crawl your way. I feel my own

fur, knowing I have failed you.

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Jan Wiezorek's debut poetry chapbook, Forests of Woundedness is forthcoming from Seven Kitchens Press. Wiezorek’s poetry appears, or is forthcoming, in The London Magazine, The Westchester Review, Lucky Jefferson, The Broadkill Review, LEON Literary Review, and elsewhere. He taught writing at St. Augustine College, Chicago, and authored the teachers’ ebook Awesome Art Projects That Spark Super Writing (Scholastic, 2011). His poetry has been awarded by the Poetry Society of Michigan. Wiezorek writes from Buchanan, Michigan.