by Laryn Bakker (published in Catapult Magazine, October 2002)

Four hundred forty pounds
of squid were snagged in the net,
dragged up from nearly a mile down
and pickled like a brain.

by Laryn Bakker (published in Arete, May 2001)

Again, the children are dancing in his
puddles. Angrily he drives them away,
and, glancing down at a footprint that
has filled with water, he is startled
to find himself trapped inside it.

by Laryn Bakker (published in Arete, May 2001)

It's not that I've forgotten --
I feed it every now and then, or at least
I set some food where it can be found. I
had a place for it on my desk at first, right
in the middle, where I could watch it play, but
it has grown feverish and cringes from the light.

It seems to like the far corner, the shadows, that
old box with the rest of your stuff inside.
I think it sneaks out at night?sometimes I hear it
lapping water from the toilet; I smell smoke and
in the morning there's a handful of ground-out cigarettes
in the sink. It has lost so much weight, and lately it has been
coughing up blood. I'm sorry. I think it needs you.

by Laryn Bakker (published in the Canon, 1998)

the wind is pleading,
waving branches
in an attempt
to communicate.

the man is ignoring it,
fondling his chainsaw and
trying to clear his mind of
leaves on trees and other propaganda.

by Laryn Bakker (published in the Canon, 1998)

Yesterday, when you stormed out the door you
knocked the mirror.
It rocked on its nail like a pendulum and
although it swayed
my reflection in it was unmoving.

by Laryn Bakker (published in Lyrical Iowa, 1997)

It has become the main attraction in
a circus sideshow, dutifully pouring its
212 thousand cubic feet of water
each second and lightly kissing the
$5.95 thrill seekers who journey down daily
to conquer the beast in their protective
yellow ponchos.

by Laryn Bakker (published in the Canon, 1997)

He leans over her study carrel,
smile ironed and wrinkle-free.
She has her notebook open and
fiddles with the edge of the page,
glancing down every so often,
trying not to blow her cover.

by Laryn Bakker (published in the Canon, 1997)

He suddenly stopped talking,
realizing that everyone was looking at

him

and that some things
should not be exposed in public.

by Laryn Bakker (published in the Canon, 1996)

King's Day celebration, 1995,
Dominican Republic

The beat of the music
pumps like blood through the barrio.
It pulses from every open door,
pounds through speakers beside shops,
and is carried on the shoulders of young men.

At this corner a crowd mills--talking,
celebrating, drinking, and
on this day laughing.

by Laryn Bakker (published in the Canon, 1996)

Sometimes it seems
  that God has taken a
    sabbatical.

Maybe it's just that we're
  all playing hooky.

by Laryn Bakker (published in the Canon, 1995)

Though his mind reels and thrashes,
his body stands like stone.
Breath comes quickly,
in small, shallow gulps,
then not at all.
A bursting chest screams out (air!)
and he gasps twice,
fighting concrete lungs
somehow frozen by Venus
into cold Medusa-stone.