2018-2019 FINALIST, COG POETRY AWARDS
Age 25
Kai Blevins
gender is intoxicating.
i’ve felt boundless joy
i’ve watched Man unravel
in its chaotic presence
searching for approval
in its shifting time pools
addicted to domination
the refusal to bend
the violence of self-aggrandizement
in the face of injustice. i’ve seen
how willing Man is to devastate
tender souls blooming toward
peace, or any foreign thing
the transcendence of connection
that does not serve him
that can’t help but serve everyone
like me. i’ve heard him snarl
that sweet, sweet lullaby and
felt him coaxing me to leave
my worries behind me
my consciousness at his feet.
I Don't Know What It's Like to Be a Man Alive
after jamie mortara*
Kai Blevins
but i do remember
how it feels to be
a man dead
the ache of my decay
hushed by the living
men that surrounded me
as if i were
growing the right way
as if it were normal and expected
that i be willing to lapse into nothingness
rather than linger
in the spaces between
it’s not unique just to me
everyone out there
knows what it’s like
to be something
that terrifies them
for example: i come from a family
with secrets in our blood
the worst of them wait for generations
before reaching the heart
imagine: an emptied
field, felled trees dragged
behind the woodline by men who know
the toil of hiding a smile and a glance
in those moments where the clearing
makes way for new life and yet still
we put our dead shoulder to the wheel
imagine: a garden
of boys buried
beneath the fears of their fathers
their tongues unable to distinguish
dirt from history
ashamed of the wildflowers
growing from their chests
eager to sever the stigmas
beat the petals
into blades
i got my first pocket knife
when i was 6, learned how
to unzip living things
the way every boy should
i remember holding
that smallmouth bass
its guts spilling
over my small hands
jerking in a way i never wanted
my body to know
years later i sliced
apples into stars
harvested the seeds and planted them
everywhere (our church / cracks in the sidewalk / my body)
begged them to birth beginnings
where i only ever saw endings
when i was a man dead
i fell in love with endings
tried my best to unzip myself
to find the secret carried for generations
to hold that blood-thick silence
in my hands triumphantly
if only for a moment
now imagine: a tree
the early summer wind
plucking apples like dandelion seeds
carrying them to people who are terrified
by their capacity to love
for example: my ancestors
* This poem borrows lines from jamie's mortara's poem, "I Don't Know What It's Like to Eat a Man Alive"
The Boy Who Cried Wolf
Kai Blevins
doesn’t speak / of the monster for 5 years / hopes he’s been / devoured by silence / the way the
boy has / still gets nauseous / at the thought of being / undone by him / considers all the times /
people said wolf / just didn’t have the teeth for it / never tried to swallow them whole / the way he
did with the boy / who turns out not to be a boy at all / wonders / if that’s what drew the wolf in /
listens as the wolf entertains the town / with wolf-jokes / watches the wolf bare his fangs / while
everyone laughs / harder / sees the wolf / parade through town / wearing an anti-wolf t-shirt /
feels the unbearable weight of everyone’s applause / goes numb / when wolf gets an award / for
being / tough on wolf-crime / takes it all back / thinks maybe / wolf is just a dog after all / figures
that’s why / he’s Man’s best friend.
Queer As In
Kai Blevins
sometimes i forget the word
contradiction altogether. it’s as if my body
has reached equilibrium for a moment
no longer in need of a word
for something so familiar. i assume
this is what it’s like to be at peace
never resisting that desire
to be unsettled by absolutely everything
your imagination can handle. the future
is always one thought away
in the distance it promises
a realization that we are all part
of a greater whole
(or something like that). anyway
i assume this is what it’s like to be
a bird drawn to the moon on a cloudless night
only aware of its body in the moments
when unexpected gusts scream
through its feathered wings. still it remains unable
to pass through the invisible barriers
that draw life to a close. i wonder
if the atmosphere ever gets lonely
or if it has abandoned language altogether
refusing to be bound by its own attempts
at creation.