KATIE RICHARDS

FALL/WINTER 2020 ISSUE #01 POET

Katie Richards is an MFA candidate at George Mason University. She is the recipient of the 2016 Mark Craver Poetry Award and the 2020 Mary Roberts Rinehart Poetry Award. Her poetry has previously appeared or is forthcoming in the South Dakota Review, DIALOGIST, Valparaiso Poetry Review, and The Inflectionist Review among other places.

GOLDEN HOUR

I will never forget the gasp of you

leaving me, your body against me, 

your cord pulsing purple, the pulses 

curved like ridges of a praying 

mantis belly, the pulsing of a snake 

pushing a mouse through its body.

Darling, color of the sun, you 

came out purple as a bruise,

eyes shut while quiet the doctor 

rubbed you and smacked 

you until you whimpered 

then screamed.