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"The Velocity of Love"

Caught In Passing: Poems, by Zan Bockes

So still we sit
in chairs that mold our breathing,
frightened birds
with feathers slimed in oil,
fish in nets, bodies
pressed against the figure
of their deaths.
We haven't spoken
for an hour. Your last
word digs holes in the air and
hangs.

Beneath this weight, Father,
tell me I'm lighter than light,
that my love for you outruns
the spinning lance
of hate.

If I could speak,
I'd tell you it doesn't matter
how hate is as strong
as the other, how quickly
exchanged for love,
just as pure in its origin.

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Zan Bockes (pronounced "Bacchus") was born in Nuremberg, Germany, and grew up in Omaha, Nebraska, where she earned a Bachelor's degree in English and a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Creative Writing from the University of Nebraska at Omaha. She graduated with a Master of Fine Arts degree in Creative Writing from the University of Montana in Missoula. She has had four nominations for the Pushcart Prize and numerous publications of fiction, poetry and nonfiction in various literary magazines. She lives in Missoula with her partner, Mike Kincaid. "The Velocity of Love" was published in her collection of poems, "Caught In Passing."

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