Liana Kapelke-Dale By Liana Kapelke-Dale
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I swallowed his flames
like flames swallow moths.
They licked my tongue sweetly,
nibbled my ripened lips,
extinguished at the back of my throat.
He tasted of newly printed books
destined to be burnt in the street
and budding leaves on the trees,
soon to be swept from the sidewalk
and cremated.
He tasted of future,
before it warps into past.
My lungs might be charred
from years of drinking down old flames,
some sizzling but none very smooth.
Or perhaps the tissue is as pink
and smooth as the skin of a
Southern debutante—
who knows?
Maybe I should have been
a lion-tamer instead,
learned to curb my cravings,
but some torrid fever always chased me
down the road to search out
the next flaming sword.
I swallowed sparks,
the blaze curling to fit my throat,
then spit them back out
in a mushroom cloud of heat and red.
I married the flames, never betrayed
by my lungs as I was by my heart.
I may have blistered my tongue
on occasion, burnt my throat
like a teenager with her first joint,
but I never meant to inhale.
I didn’t think I had scarred.
Then a cough started to creep
through me like a clinging vine.
Now the fire extinguishes, suffocates
pitifully when I eat it.
My body betrays me, will not release.
It is eroding like forest from wildfire.
Outwardly I remain unblemished,
but I am left to suspect
that I am not so pure within.
My lungs feel like scorched caverns.
So please, take your needle
and prick off a piece to examine;
put me under your microscope.
Tell me your diagnosis.
Liana Kapelke-Dale is a poet and ATA-Certified Translator (Spanish to English). She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Spanish Language and Literature from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and a Juris Doctor from the University of Wisconsin Law School. She is the author of Seeking the Pink (Kelsay Books), a full-length book of poetry nominated for the 2022 Eric Hoffer Book Award; Little words seeking/Mute human for mutual/Gain and maybe more (Irrelevant Press), a chapbook of personal ads written in haiku form; and Specimens, her first (self-published) chapbook. Her poetry has been featured in myriad journals and is forthcoming in Cerasus Magazine and Full House Literary Magazine. In her spare time, she paints, collages, and plays her guitar, Asher, badly. Liana lives in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, with her lovely pointer-hound mix, Poet. You can purchase a copy of Seeking the Pink here. Follow Liana on Twitter @liana_espectral.
Why we chose this piece: The premise of this poem is so unique, and Liana’s voice really shines through. The opening is compelling, and the use of couplets forces you to focus on each moment. And that ending? A punch to the stomach.
