Two Poems by Nomi Stone
The Hunter Dresses As Prey
Rocking, the body is hide,
palmed horn, jaw &
gum, thrashed-up antler,
til under the hat: a human
mouth half-
breathes in the firs. Face
to face, both not and yes,
both dead & loved, am I
your fawn :: I am.
War Game: Plug In the Role and Play
Plug in: Kill. Play: King. Play beating
Heart in my shoulder, painted
Wounds circled by bees.
You asked the part
of me I kept hidden. It was every
softness I didn’t give them,
the life awake,
whole,
trembling.
About the Author:
Nomi Stone’s second collection of poems, Kill Class is forthcoming from Tupelo Press in 2019. Poems appear recently or will soon in POETRY, American Poetry Review, The New Republic, The Academy of American Poets’ “Poem-a-Day” series, Bettering American Poetry 2017, The Best American Poetry 2016, and elsewhere. Kill Class is based on two years of fieldwork she conducted within war trainings in mock Middle Eastern villages erected by the US military across America.
