Rivka Clifton
Bodies
The car was on fire. A shadow twirled. Bodies spilled out of it and onto the snow. In the night, a shadow stirred. A flame shook like a hummingbird’s heart. I shrank. My shadow hung. I touched myself. A shadow gripped a throat. A writhing. I exhaled smoke like a shadow. In my own body far away, a pulsing bass consumed itself.
The bodies dragged across the snow the long lines of their escape. My hands floated away from my body; my legs floated away from my body; my guts stayed put in my ribs. A shadow pulled apart jaws and shoved its hand in.
I used my cell phone. Inside my lungs, a shitty ghost. Everywhere the sound of ruffling feathers. The burning car was far away; a shadow stretched over my face. Slowly, the dark, a glinting fish, a bird’s ruffled neck.
How It Feels
The car was on fire
A shadow twirled
Bodies spilled out
A shadow stirred
In the night the flames
Myself a shadow stretched
Over my face I shrunk
Like a hummingbird’s heart
My shadow hung
In my own body far away
The bodies dragged
I touched myself
My hands floated away
My guts stayed put
I used my cell phone
A shadow gripped a throat
Everywhere the sound of ruffling
A shadow pulled apart jaws
Shoved its hand in
The sound of ruffling
I exhaled smoke
Like a shadow
Inside my lungs
A pulsing bass consumed
The shitty ghost of
The burning car
B Rivka Clifton (she/her) is the transfemme author of Muzzle (JackLeg Press) as well as the chapbooks MOT and Agape (from Osmanthus Press). She has work in: Pleiades, Guernica, Black Warrior Review, Colorado Review, and other magazines.