Issue 6, Spring/Summer 2008

The Same Tomato by Sarah Mangold

These were the words
delivered feet-first to the point
located in one's own savage past

There were lingering doubts
prospects of a few hundred unlucky women
italicizing cultural decline
obscure Vietnamese hamlets
a slip of the translator's pen

just become a part of the wallpaper
believe that it is better
it is a quiet brutal war
the question that should have been asked
as the worshipers tried to retreat

You might think all of this would have
sought the structures
ruptures within the symbolic order
but it had to be done
it seemed an obvious call
the destruction of eyes has an appeal