Size / / /

Where have you been, Tattertongue?
     lying with pelvis and ribcage
     wanting want
     old. old.
     reading the mouth for
     sugared ginger for
     blood sausage
 
Why did you leave?
     there was a forest
     of snapping saplings
     old. old.
 
What did you find?
     the vertebrae
     they were chopped
 
What did you do?
     caught a horse
     boiled its hooves
 
What did you taste?
     only
     bones and marrow-dust
 
Why dangle from a noose of nettle for so long?
     a mayfly in amber
     old. old—
But how old?
     honey dripped in Loki's gaze
What did you eat?
     numbers numbers
     old. old.
What did you eat?
     numbers numbers
     old. old.
What did you see?
     birch bark, ribs—
Did you cry?
     salt cod—
Where did you sleep?
What did you drink? What did you eat?
What did you eat?
     numbers, numb—
Why
did you return?
     of fiddleheads coiled in candlefish oil
 
Where is your tongue?
     sealed in a jar of black mead

Publication of this poem was made possible by a donation from Catherine Lundoff. (Thanks, Catherine!) To find out more about our funding model, or donate to the magazine, see the Support Us page.



Jenn Grunigen is a writer, folklorist, and metal drummer. She is a graduate of the 2016 Clarion Writers’ workshop; her writing has appeared in Shimmer, Spolia and elsewhere. Her SF novel, Skyglass, a wild tale of sex, elves and rock ‘n’ roll, is available now from Chromatic Press.
Current Issue
25 Mar 2024

Looking back, I see that my initial hope for this episode was that the mud would have a heartbeat and a heart that has teeth and crippling anxiety. Some of that hope has become a reality, but at what cost?
to work under the / moon is to build a formidable tomorrow
Significantly, neither the humans nor the tigers are shown to possess an original or authoritative version of the narrative, and it is only in such collaborative and dialogic encounters that human-animal relations and entanglements can be dis-entangled.
By: Sammy Lê
Art by: Kim Hu
the train ascends a bridge over endless rows of houses made of beams from decommissioned factories, stripped hulls, salvaged engines—
Issue 18 Mar 2024
Strange Horizons
Issue 11 Mar 2024
Issue 4 Mar 2024
Issue 26 Feb 2024
Issue 19 Feb 2024
Issue 12 Feb 2024
Issue 5 Feb 2024
Issue 29 Jan 2024
Issue 15 Jan 2024
Issue 8 Jan 2024
Load More
%d bloggers like this: