70
2015
NORTH CAROLINA L I T E R A R Y RE V I E W
FINALIST, 2014 JAMES APPLEWHITE POETRY PRIZE BY MARCUS GREGORY JOHNSTON
desertion Yes, if you must know, I am the fulsome crapshoot & prism of our day. I am the ageless, nameless wonder – the desperately cool, young, frank, & defiantly hot. I am the coup de grâce don’t you know – the Mao Zedong reincarnate. I am the mindless, merciless cunt who stole your dignity, manners, & charm. Many eons ago I emerged & billowed so gracelessly from the hot-stuffed but artificially beginning yo-yo (or small potato) phases & far-out places of the Co-operative Republic of Guyana. I enjoyed me some carousing too in those long-gone & never-to-be-found debaucheries of yore, not to mention some empty cabbages, canisters, saliva, & cataclysmic clunkers (& high-caloric cabuggabooms) of what I liked to call (in my more memorable moments & undergarment) Lake Titicaca, motherfuckers!,1
1
i.e., effeuiller la marguerite
Listen to MARCUS GREGORY JOHNSTON read this poem at the 2014 North Carolina Writers Conference. The poet received a BA in English from the University of Georgia in 1999 and an MFA in creative writing from UNC Wilmington in 2003. He now lives in Rockville, MD, with his daughter. His poem “reconnaissance” was runner-up in the 2011 Pocataligo Poetry Contest sponsored by the journal Yemassee. He also received one of two honorable mentions in the 2012 Writers at Work annual poetry contest. He has completed one book-length manuscript of poems and is working on a second one.
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