Michelle Bitting: Reporting Back

When the men and women

became bully monsters

backed by scum

bent to fetch 

golf balls off the green 

& rolling in ink

from the slough.

When few

read print anymore, scrolling

the nets

& threatening to take

it all,

including your baby’s milk

bottle & last biscuit,

we thought

the headless horsemen riding

our direction

less terrifying.

Who says decapitation

is all bad, anyway?

Those free-floating cabezas—

ancient, adrift

on song-strung shores

are always ready to party.

Their salvaged seas,

their mystical gowns 

sewn with so much to teach 

about disruption. 

The merit of dreams

hauled back from. 

We should have drowned

this time. In love 

with mystery

& fish, the hero-ed

dark, the matches 

struck to keep 

multitudes fed. The heart 

swilled inside 

the surfing eye

& risen lining, 

the tides 

we keep climbing

up the belly of the whale.

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Copyright 2023 Michelle Bitting

Michelle Bitting’s poetry collections include Nightmares & Miracles published by Two Sylvias Press. She lives in Southern California.