The Wardrobe's Best Dressed: Welcome to Midland by Logen Cure

This selection, chosen by managing editor Krista Cox, is from Welcome to Midland by Logen Cure (Deep Vellum 2021).

Dream in Which I Am Wile E. Coyote

I am Carnivorous vulgaris,
Famishus famishus, other fake
Latin terms for hungry,

all ribs and red-rimmed
yellow eyes. I know
only one desire.

My desert is vacant
apart from the roadrunner.
I am forever chasing,
wielding knife and fork, down highways
disappearing into orange horizon.
Every time I get close,
the music swells.

I think ACME can save me,
a better blueprint
could tip the topsy
turvy laws of physics
in my favor. I imagine
picking my long, sharp teeth
with a purple feather.

I know
there is no death here.
I plummet from cliffs, crush
myself with anvils, explode
and explode and explode and still
live to paint the next
perfect railway tunnel.

The train is always coming.

That blasted meep-meep
echos in the rust-red canyon.
I am strapped to a rocket.
I am lighting the fuse.

Logen Cure is a queer poet and educator. She curates Inner Moonlight, the monthly reading series and podcast at The Wild Detectives in Dallas. She earned her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. Her debut full-length poetry collection, Welcome to Midland (Deep Vellum Publishing), was shortlisted for the Reading the West Book Awards. Learn more at www.logencure.com.

Krista Cox is the Managing Editor of Sundress Publications, The Wardrobe, and Doubleback Review. She’s a poet and editor and currently pursuing her master’s in clinical mental health counseling. Mostly, like everyone, she’s just trying to stay hydrated while she fights the system.