POETRY : DEAR THOUGHT CLIMATE by Alex Mattraw
We have been big, big, big fans of Alex Mattraw’s poetry for a while now. It’s hard edged but somehow lovely, dabbling in experimental but entirely relatable at a base, human level. It’s wonderful stuff and we couldn’t be more excited for Mattraw to release Raw, Anyone, a brand new collection out from The Cultural Society, and even more excited that the poet allowed us to feature one of our very favorite pieces of poetry (both from the collection and really, maybe from this year) right here on our website.
Give it a read. Give it a listen. Give it a home in your brain.
But first, buy a copy of Raw, Anyone.
And then come check out Mattraw and a host of other great readers at The Racket Reading Series: BEGIN AGAIN on Tuesday, December 6th at The Sycamore.
Still greedy for more? Check out more work from Raw, Anyone from Issue 69 of The Racket Journal.
Dear Thought Climate
Alex Mattraw
Do I still find room in you?
Autocorrect me because porn peers deeper cells.
You reframe poem with pork, porn with
poem. I buy chops. Think sweat rings,
cupped palms. I rehearse you in data-
sheets, bed bacon shreds left in teeth
I brominate hips. Lick your display. Eat
flame retardants. Wear your gifts: decorous
handcuffs, elegant case. We’ll blame gold. Single
use, you scroll our infection rate, block
texts before the battery dies. Before Times
dissolve DDT. Soil means at your back-
bone I whisper screens I’ve never felt
nitrous Could this be oxide happening
"Dear Thought Climate” was originally published in Tupelo Quarterly.
