Subway

Automatic glass maw     swallows every platform in pincer jaw     and he is there     suddenly

yet stagnant        smile stuck deep in his cheeks        mouth hung slack       a chassis rumbling

before the rev       putrid eyes drooping       detailed with purple vein    and when the train car

empties      he is upon you      fingers through belt loop     thumbs swiveling trails of gasoline

grease behind them    like the tracks of a snail   and this is how it is   wheels ever whirring in                                                                                                                                         
                                                                                                                                laughing spits

Kara Goughnour is a queer writer and documentarian living in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
She is the 2018 winner of the Gerald Stern Poetry Award and has work published or
forthcoming in Third Point Press, Riggwelter Journal, The Southampton Review, and
others. Follow her on Twitter @kara_goughnour or read her collected and exclusive
works at karagoughnour.com