MICHAL LEIBOWITZ

Yiscah Discovers Dissonance

Yiscah slices her stomach
open and drains sideways, like the sea bass

she passed at the market, its scales shivering
with the wings of blow flies. Yiscah opens

her mouth and imagines the bodies
inside her. Feet tar-like and sticky, the gentle

brush of their beating wings on the insides
of her cheeks. Tonight, her whole city sleeps

and Yiscah is alone with the darkness, with the image
of the draining fish heavy across her eyelids.

She can still feel the weight of the cleaver on the
block, the way the dappled scales slid apart

like a myth. She pictures the black pearls
inside. The bodies within still, biding.






Michal Leibowitz was born and raised in White Plains, NY. Her poetry has recently appeared or is forthcoming in Spry, Up the Staircase Quarterly, Winter Tangerine Review and a Gigantic Sequins feature. Michal is a freshman at Stanford University.



Boxcar Poetry Review - ISSN 1931-1761