Matthew Olzmann: [S]uddenly the poem becomes this meditation on mortality, but at no point do you think, “Oh my gosh, Yusef, why is he talking to a maggot or how does he know this maggot? Or what kind of relationship do they have?”
The first boy to call me beautiful / had hair like a waving fist, walked / down the hallway, radius of curl / beckoning white hands that he’d / allow, though, I’d watch a little / light in him dim to tar.
"So it’s a surprise to you—and not entirely a pleasant one—when you fall in love with someone who has a penis. You thought you’d set up defenses against the possibility, but here he is, and here you are, loving him."
Summer was ending, and my sister was shrinking. I first noticed when we were sitting on the dock near the lake at our summer camp; as she stretched her bare…