POETRY

Lactobacilli

By Catherine Carter     VOLUME 53.1

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Invisible and everywhere,
on your hands,
on your shoes,
in your nose, lining
your ells of bowel,
we lay down scraps
of chromosomes
and pick them up
like screwdrivers
or cards, if half the cards
are wild as sauerkraut--
E. coli, listeria,
seaweed, straight flush.

Nor are you you,
some single entity
cruising the lonely black
star-seas like a whale:
you are the ship, the host,
the poker table.
We are crew
and gamblers and spirit,
your spirit, the one many-
bodied soul you can know
for sure. Genius loci.
Spirits of place.
Full house.


 


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CATHERINE CARTER lives with her husband near Western Carolina University, where she is a professor in the English education and professional writing programs. Her most recent collection of poetry is Larvae of the Nearest Stars (LSU Press, 2019); her work has also appeared in Best American Poetry 2009, Orion, Poetry, and Ploughshares, among others.


VOLUME 53.1