White Whale Review | MRB Chelko | "Outside we're all"

MRB Chelko

MRB Chelko is a recent graduate of The University of New Hampshire's MFA program and Editorial Assistant of the unbound journal, Tuesday; An Art Project. She has poems in current or forthcoming issues of AGNI Online, Court Green, Clementine, DIAGRAM, Lake Effect, Weave and in back-issues of many other fine journals. Chelko's poems have been featured on Verse Daily and nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Her chapbook is What to Tell the Sleeping Babies (sunnyoutside, 2010). She lives in Central Harlem with her husband, Nick, and dog, Chuck.

Featured Work

MRB Chelko

Outside we're all

Outside we're all

at the river bottom. In the park,

I'm a stone a man

skipped once, on the street, a single oar

flailing against a cliff edge. Wet,

everything changes. The city fills

with iced tea, deadly

gas, the indistinct memory

of its own missing

hand. I woke this morning

with the knowledge that

a handless body might still leave

a hand behind. It's a game

that's not a game at all. Tag.

You're lost forever. I've found

I hallucinate a little

in the afternoon. Or I half-

dream I hallucinate. It's complex. Like loving not

your lover, only love. Now, just there, see

how those significant bits

of my life float past in paper