Two Poems
by Holly Karepetkova
THEORIES OF EXISTENCE
When I began
outside
the plot was off and
growing
an object
the object
absent
from the story
a battle for
control
of a whole
now so little
that hasn’t been
shredded limb
from limb
unhinged from
the sky
language
I am not
I am
the story was
flagging me down
running
its own limbs
devouring
being devoured I
myself
of myself
authenticity
the myth
outside
is left
torn to shreds
from limb
an ocean
the horizon
without a place to land
sheared to emojis
a reduction
reduced
THEORIES OF EXISTENCE
When I began the story was just a story, a face made of stone. The man’s chisel driving through me like a line I couldn’t cross until I did, an object devouring, an object being devoured, a song emerging like music from the mouth of a broken pipe. In the story the woman is brought to life as a gift for a man who would not love a human woman until he had one of his own design, beating silence against her lips. The plot grows its own limbs, fastening, grabbing hold, until one day I recognize her as myself, a darkness I cannot undo. Now so little is left. The real woman grows skin, unable to refuse his touch, unable to return to stone.
Holly Karapetkova is Poet Laureate Emerita of Arlington County and the recipient of a 2022 Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellowship. She is the author of two books of poetry, Words We Might One Day Say, winner of the 2010 Washington Writers’ Publishing House Poetry Award, and Towline, winner of the 2016 Vern Rutsala Poetry Contest from Cloudbank Books. Her current manuscript projects, Dear Empire and Planter’s Wife grapple with the deep wounds left by our history of racism, slavery, and environmental destruction. She is also the author of over 20 books for children. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing and a PhD in English and Comparative Literature and teaches at Marymount University.
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