Alex Carrigan
Own the Dirt
After Jericho Brown's "Second Language"
They thought they could own the dirt they were bound to.
They thought they were born with a carrot stalk on top of their head.
Their heads were pulled straight out of the soil which left
a hole waiting for them to one day put their feet into.
They each pushed their feet into the ground when they were old
enough to understand why there was barbed wire all around them.
Around them, they saw others pulled and plucked, only to one
day return and try to claim refuge in the earth they once tilled.
They would till the ground, uncovering small stones they'd play
marbles with, for they couldn't bring their toys out of the field.
The field always called them back to water the ground with their
sweat, always made them afraid there'd be no crops come next season.
The next season, they saw their sweat didn't make any carrot stalks emerge.
They really thought they could own the dirt they were bound to.
Bio
Alex Carrigan (he/him) is a Pushcart-nominated editor, poet, and critic from Alexandria, VA. He is the author
of Now Let's Get Brunch: A Collection of RuPaul's Drag Race Twitter Poetry (Querencia Press, 2023) and
May All Our Pain Be Champagne: A Collection of Real Housewives Twitter Poetry (Alien Buddha Press, 2022).
He has appeared in The Broadkill Review, Sage Cigarettes, Barrelhouse, Fifth Wheel Press, Cutbow Quarterly,
and more. Visit
carriganak.wordpress.com
or follow him on Twitter
@carriganak for more info.