RADON CLASSROOM

 

Fumes impregnate brains taking refuge in animal bladders, percolating up through natal ore, a savage progeny of gases lodged in the branches of bronchial trees, attacking seeds of cell nuclei, diluting sulphurous life, quicksilver death.

Children curl beneath classroom desks, hands clasped behind head, "frail bony helmets," spines like trees planted in a verdant carpet.

Obscured roots spread through primitive lives
                                                            bearing fruit under soiled conditions.

An apple for the teacher, her luminous face sealed within rubbery mask, hands mated between thighs born from a sea of radium salts...

Butterfly mandala hangs
on a wall, slightly
    askew.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Paratext