The Gods of Broken Glass

Poem by PENEL ALDEN

We pray to the gods of broken glass:

Of bricks through windows Outside inside

At night my bare feet follow the moisture of the wolf caves

Where we monsters share fire

Hard edge meets hard edge The soft edge of the horizon

Is a metaphor for my soft old flesh

My long vine fingers which can still throw stones

"This poem is part of a larger project, The Gods of Broken Glass, which explores anti-humanism, apocalypse, and joy. Alden here also considers the possibility of ecstasy as part of inhabiting an aging body. They fantasize about the annihilation of the individual and ego, and they desire the blurring, the overflowing, of boundary and being." - Penel Alden