Poem of the Month
The Kingdom Is

By Mia Anderson

Published on September 1, 2014

The kingdom
is up to you. Like
the manette

the cashier hands you
at the grocer’s — “your turn”;
“c’est à vous.

Gens du pays,
c’est votre tour
we sing and it comes

to the same thing
does the kingdom: room
de vous laisser

parler d’amour.
Stepping into love
is up to you.

The manette is in your hand,
the kingdom. Punch in.
Here it comes —

never so simple
never yet refused!
There’s room, the debit paid

you know not how.
Oh, you know the dark fires

and you know they are quenched:
your dark fires, your own, your wrath

by the simple act of
punching in your identity —
admitting. “This is me.”

You’re in.
That’s how the kingdom
works.

More Poetry

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One with the strength of many
alone in the distant North End.
People before profit.

it’s a seemingly endless descent.
Marlyn’s streets do not resemble
one with the strength of many

morbid singularities
entirely unaware of
people before profit

Yorick

Bookending our VHS library In the basement closet, beside ski suits, Is our family’s one-man Capuchin Crypt, A skull Dad kept from med school that just sits, Waiting to be played with, bored, unburied.