Rules of the Form
[ ] discuss the gaps. I
try to search my concealed memories
for the exit; which door leads back
into the light. It makes no sense.
I touched his [ ]
& wince. He bound my [ ]
so no sound escapes. Another sense
leaves. I’m getting ahead of myself.
The image captured [ ]. I shook
free. On the other side of [ ]
it was noon. I knew this, but couldn’t stretch
to [ ] him. We grew
late. That’s unspecific. I’m trailing
behind myself.
The therapist says write it out
include every detail. Keeping
them will ruin you.
I’m a poet until I walk back
into my body
& feel his [ ]
now bleed
the color like [ ]
now press on
speech unstrung by [ ]
what hurts
Although [ ] isn’t specific
I write it like his name
[ ].
Who refused to claim
what grows silent, what is kept. Bad poets
cannot remember & I [ ]
a form stitched into curtains, which cover the door
& [ ] prevents my leaving. I have no say
in [ ] the locks. Senses
return. He [ ] the gaps. to be specific.
Memory is a difficult form, a late & endless search, now
I’d let [ ] ruin me.
Duncan Slagle is a queer poet and performer from Alaska and then Minnesota. Duncan is the author of FATHER HUNT (L’Éphémère Review) & currently attends the University of Wisconsin-Madison as a First Wave Scholar studying Ancient Greek, Latin, and Creative Writing. The winner of the 2018 Crab Creek Review Poetry Prize, the 2018 Mikrokosmos Poetry Prize, and a 2018 Best of the Net nominee, Duncan has more work online at duncanslagle.com.