A Poem by Trevor Ketner

Author: Poetry Editor

May 10, 2017

This week, a poem by Trevor Ketner.

Exodus
               Chicago Pride 2014

There’s more than the trauma of opening,
___________________________closure just that, a click.

The rugby player was attending seminary,
had a girlfriend but things were complicated, so

maybe the storm is something I unleashed on myself,
a black dog, a black whip that flowed wild
____________________________from its leather handle,

a cold shower after a cold shower after a cold shower after
________________________________a cold shower after…

Must rivers through cities always be blood?

I’m asking if holding a man like a woman like a shard
of purple glass is more than just what the city dreams

for herself, her streets clogged today with drunken children
________who wear rainbows from China in their shirts.

All these children touch in the alleys and rip
each other like underwear, open
__________________________*every window like a door.

——

TREVOR KETNER holds an MFA from the University of Minnesota. They have been or will be published in Best New Poets 2015, Day One, Ninth Letter, West Branch, Pleiades, The Offing, Devil’s Lake, Boxcar Poetry Review and elsewhere. Their essays and reviews can be found in The Kenyon Review, Boston Review, The Rumpus, and The Collagist. They were a resident at the Vermont Studio Center, received the 2014 Gesell Award in Poetry, and are Associate Poetry Editor for Slice Magazine. See trevordaneketner.com for more info.