Dean Kostos
THE LIVER IS THE COCK’S COMB after a painting by Arshile Gorky
Dean Kostos Sun-warmed apricots release their scent. A boy from Khorkom breathes deep & tastes their color with his eyes. War’s impasto of flame. Charred carrion: limbs & entrails. His famished mother dies in his arms. The boy draws a scorched landscape, vermilioned. That artist is now a man. He hangs his voice from a desiccated tear, dusts his knees, unpeels his face & name. Sails toward a new self in New York City. Night blooms inside a skyscraper. Petals wither. Flute-hollow skeletons exhale a satin sky, a coffin lining.
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