DC

Green shoots on one side
of a January branch—
half choose hope

Congress—the mighty chambers—
a heart? a stomach?—two dogs
wrestling over street meat

The South 

Crawfish, a hundred perhaps, boiling
in a pot—a lava of spooning hoards—
we’ll suck the juices from their heads
& sex ourselves to sleep.

Thousands led to a stadium’s
mouth—the stadium
is fed better

Pecos River, Texas

My hand upon a man’s hand
blown red with paint dust
ten thousand years ago

Joe Pan’s first collection, Autobiomythography & Gallery, was named “Best First Book of the Year” by Coldfront. He is the founding editor & publisher of Brooklyn Arts Press & serves as the poetry editor for the arts magazine Hyperallergic. His work has appeared in such places as Boston Review, Brooklyn Rail, Cimarron Review, Denver Quarterly, Glimmer Train, H_ngm_n, Phoebe, & has been excerpted in The New York Times. He grew up along the Space Coast of Florida and now lives in Brooklyn.