which species leaves their kill on the street. which beast burdens the world with itself.
which foul thing slouches toward the west. the west was never won. we wrested it. we
manifested it to wrestle. then we drew our guns at high noon capitalism and it died. we
lost. we wondered what about ourselves could be unnatural. so prone to reason that we
ended it, sand and wind. we bested the animals. we survived. we hid our hair from
rainstorms and in caves we lumped our sticks together to make joy again. scratched our
little arms and legs, felt glad. loved our reflections. even in this dim light. even in the
cold. how much we accomplished. our monstrosity. our immaterial wants. our suns and
effigies.
Born in the Soviet Union, Marina Blitshteyn and her family fled to the US in 1991 as refugees. She is the author of Two Hunters, her first full-length collection, published by Argos Books in 2019 with a CLMP Face-Out grant. Prior chapbooks include Russian for Lovers (Argos Books), $kill$ (dancing girl press), Nothing Personal (Bone Bouquet Books), and most recently Sheet Music (Sunnyoutside Press). Her work has been anthologized in the new Brooklyn Poets Anthology, The &Now Awards 3: The Best Innovative Writing, Why I Am Not a Painter, and My Next Heart: New Buffalo Poetry. She teaches in NYC and occasionally runs the Loose Literary Canons, a feminist reading group. 
