in a world where silkworms turn
in the wind, into moths
with prodigious hunger & no mouths, where
you are possible even the most
miscreant of sinners dies
on their knees. we grieve the bone’s imprint
burnished from dirt
like the velvet depression
a lost diamond leaves behind. beloved,
even the apocalypse is fleeting
like a bruise just shy of sinew
you can linger as long
as you like but we can’t give up
the ghost on every hill.
where the desert spills itself empty
rattlesnakes need only 500 calories
a year to survive & still
mice burrow unseen miles away
in forgotten grain. what i mean
to say is you can’t give back
what you haven’t taken. may i be
worthy of this reward—bless the broken soil
& all petty thieves when captured, withdraw
my shield in a house of shattered glass.
it’s been exhausting
remaining alive on perfect days
where evening’s strangled light pools between limbs
swollen around each other
like a ribcage. when the sky opens at dusk
a predator’s lonely rattle stirs quiet
as a church mouse, dust motes
gliding in the stained glass glow
settle like misplaced planets. when you open
your mouth, a soldier drops his sword
clean as a priest but shrewdly
you are primed for famine, teeth bloodless
& frantic as a tuning fork hit the bone
& everybody hears it
sing, even the light falling
from stars already dead.
Anthony Thomas Lombardi is a writer, educator, organizer, & romantic in revolt. He is the author of murmurations (YesYes Books, 2025) & the founder & director of Word is Bond, a community-centered benefit reading series partnered with Brooklyn Poets that raises funds for transnational relief efforts & mutual aid organizations. He was a Poetry Project 2021-2022 Emerge-Surface-Be Fellow; has taught or continues to teach with Borough of Manhattan Community College, Paris College of Art, Brooklyn Poets, Florida State University, Polyphony Lit’s apprenticeship programming, & community programming throughout New York City; & currently serves as a poetry editor for Sundog Lit. His work has appeared in Best New Poets 2023, Guernica, Black Warrior Review, Nashville Review, Narrative Magazine, & elsewhere. He hails from Brooklyn where he lives with his cat, Dilla.