~ Delta Poetry Review ~

Caleb Tankersley

small town zoo

The tiger’s tongue laps a tepid pool

tastes the distance she’s come.

People bring children,

push their shoulders forward, clutch them back.

She rarely moves, rarely has reason.

The zebras and ostriches are the same

beautiful shadows.

Regulars stroll through on Saturdays:

“Old toothless tiger but goddamn if he isn’t our tiger.”

She looks at them with what they read as love.

She wants them in tall grasses

the smell of her children nearby

a throat between her teeth.

At night she follows the visitors home

smells them far across the dark.

They are more connected and in dangerous love

than any of them know

here, in Small Town.

forest fire

Certain trees grow best in ash

relish the flame

some people are only good in emergencies

true selves crackling open like seed pods

in extremes, forced by heat

pressured out into the gray world

open their eyes, lose color,

begin the long work of growing tall

the way smoke rises, the way rain falls

in columns, in spouts so strong

you’re never sure what’s moving up

or down.

Embrace destruction,

the heat of chaos covers the world

and every growing tree, still tall

Caleb Tankersley is the author of the story collection Sin Eaters—winner of the Permafrost Book Prize—and the poetry chapbook Jesus Works the Night Shift. His writing can be found in Carve, The Cimarron Review, Puerto del Sol, Sycamore Review, and other magazines. He is a Visiting Assistant Professor at the University of St. Thomas and serves as Managing Director for Split/Lip Press.