{"id":15018,"date":"2018-12-01T01:41:26","date_gmt":"2018-12-01T07:41:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/?p=15018"},"modified":"2018-12-01T09:43:13","modified_gmt":"2018-12-01T15:43:13","slug":"saying-grace-in-a-time-of-too-much-elegy-for-a-future-loss","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/archives\/15018","title":{"rendered":"Saying Grace in a Time of Too Much (Elegy for a Future Loss)"},"content":{"rendered":"

After us, Lord, that kudzu\u2019s a-coming.<\/span>
\n<\/span>A great green wave gonna feast on our graves,
\n<\/span>flood the highways, get blind drunk and glutted
\n<\/span>on our scratches in the dirt. It was good
\n<\/span>for a while though, shacked up in our lovers
\n<\/span>mesh tent, loose, on the lam, the blood-hungry<\/span><\/p>\n

mosquitoes knocking, the veggies hungry
\n<\/span>to swallow us up. End time\u2019s a-coming.
\n<\/span>The bloodhounds out for murderous lovers.<\/span>
\n<\/span>After us, the whole world one long lush grave,
\n<\/span>vines for veins, and no one to say it\u2019s good,
\n<\/span>our throats compost, flowers for gutturals.<\/span><\/p>\n

Flashes of eloquence, we knelt, gutted
\n<\/span>trout by streams, saying gilt-tongued grace, hungry
\n<\/span>as animals, as bible salesmen. Good
\n<\/span>Lord, like wildfire that green\u2019s a-coming,
\n<\/span>coming-for-to-carry us to our graves,
\n<\/span>the fallow field, the seed\u2019s long-lost lover.<\/span><\/p>\n

I tried for elegy, my basil-eyed love,
\n<\/span>to be read the night you leave me gutted,
\n<\/span>my fat tomato heart fallen, a grave
\n<\/span>man indeed. The burning world\u2019s hungry
\n<\/span>for us to leave, for that all-a-coming
\n<\/span>canopy, that raw, all-consuming god.<\/span><\/p>\n

Honey, apocalypse ain\u2019t the end. Good
\n<\/span>endings swing a scythe, unearth new lovers,
\n<\/span>buried gardens. Nature\u2019s knight\u2019s a-coming,
\n<\/span>riding our own fire right toward us, glutted
\n<\/span>on butter and bourbon and gas, hungry
\n<\/span>to save his beloved, lay us in our graves.<\/span><\/p>\n

God, let us bless the earth with our graves,
\n<\/span>make marigolds bloom from bone-dust, make good
\n<\/span>of our grand Gomorrah days. How hungry
\n<\/span>have we been? A moody, mismatched lover
\n<\/span>who refuses to give up, dream-glutted
\n<\/span>on tomorrow, flesh forever a-coming.<\/span><\/p>\n

Lord, let us still be hungry in our graves.
\n<\/span>Let what\u2019s a-coming come for good, the earth
\n<\/span>its own beloved, glutted after we\u2019re gone.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Greg Emilio<\/a><\/h6>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After us, Lord, that kudzu\u2019s a-coming. A great green wave gonna feast on our graves, flood the highways, get blind drunk and glutted on our scratches in the dirt. It was good for a while though, shacked up in our lovers mesh tent, loose, on the lam, the blood-hungry mosquitoes knocking, the veggies hungry to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1704,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[54],"tags":[25],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Jypy-3Ue","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15018"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1704"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15018"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15018\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15061,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15018\/revisions\/15061"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15018"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15018"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15018"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}