Map Literary: A Journal of Contemporary Writing and Art
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  • Poetry
    • Richard Ryal
    • Sherwood Anderson
    • Mark DeCarteret
    • Dennis Hinrichsen Poetry
    • Daniel Biegelson
    • Natan Last
    • Jim Daniels Poetry
    • Michael Chang
    • D E Steward
    • Benjamin Paloff Poetry
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  • Fiction
    • On Experimental Fiction
    • Mark Cassidy, "How I Met My Wife"
    • Emily Trachtenberg, "Plum"
    • Hector Donovan-Gonzalez
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    • Jenessa Abrams, "You Never Wish That Upon Anyone"
    • Eros Livieratos, "On Feeling"
    • Halsted M. Bernard, "Your Hands"
    • Justin Meckes, "The Gash"
    • Reb Livingston, from "Bombyonder"
    • Craig Foltz, "Without Stigma"
  • Nonfiction
    • Martha Wiseman, "Loose Ends"
    • Jan Jolly, "Through My Father's Glasses"
    • Kristina Moriconi, "Still Looking"
    • Wm. Anthony Connolly, "IGY"
    • Cal Freeman, "Loosestrife"
    • W.F. Lantry, "The Strange Beauty of the Unfamiliar"
    • Michael Roloff, "Accretion"
    • Andrew Sunshine, "John Hancock's John Hancock"
    • Diane Payne, "3 micro memoirs"
    • Luc Sante, "Flesh and Bone"
    • Isobel O'Hare, "Failure: A Love Letter"
    • Melissa Wiley, "Barbed Wire Fence"
    • Ashley Wilkinson, "fractional distillation"
  • Art
Picture

Will Walker


​CRACKERS
 
Somewhere among the Olmec heads
that weigh ten tons and the axes smooth as water
 
and the little masks with faces you want to talk to,
if only you could travel—briefly, with a guaranteed
 
uneventful germ-free return––across the millennia
to admire the chiseled features and perfect
 
enameled teeth of the living models,
you no longer have to wonder what the subjects
 
would say to you, because they begin talking,
or mouthing murmurs from their pedestals
 
and plastic cases, lit from above or below
for maximum dramatic effect. Crackers, they say,
 
through their eyes, in perfect English, the words
emerging from their frozen features.
 
––That’s what we want. Crackers, the gluten-free jobs
with sesame seeds. A slice of cheese. Even a lowly
 
tortilla would do. And a cup of that fermented juice
whose formula has been lost to the jungle.
 
Crackers, they all say, lighting the shadows that hover.
The voices have spoken. I am their emissary.


​
EGGS
 
Out walking the dogs, I notice what they’re thinking
clear as day. In their modest thought balloons
 
there hovers an egg––hardboiled and peeled,
glistening and impervious, a glowing white translucence,
 
such indescribable integrity, a thing the same
in any language, a protein pill like the watery sun
 
in today’s overcast, shining like a blind eye.
Or like the egg I eat at breakfast––no culinary sensation,
 
just a hedge against high blood sugar.
The dogs carry the eggs so freely––one to each thought balloon,
 
a pair of eggs on leash. The eggs shine whitely
on each blade of grass that’s sniffed, endorsing
 
the invisible scent of the world, the passage
of other dogs with their perfect unthought eggs
 
like serene bubbles on a slow-moving stream,
reflecting everything without knowing it, gliding
 
on the surface that is the only dimension
they will ever know, or need.

Copyright © 2016 Map Literary and Will Walker

Picture
Will Walker lives in San Francisco with his wife. He is a former editor of the Haight Ashbury Literary Journal. His collection of poems, Wednesday after Lunch, is available on Amazon.
published by
The Department of English
College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences
The William Paterson University of New Jersey
Copyright © 2012-2022 Map Literary
Map Literary

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  • About
    • Masthead
    • Submissions
    • Rachel Wetzsteon Chapbook Award
    • NJ High School Writing Contest
    • In Print
    • Subscribe
    • Links
    • Internship Opportunity
    • WPU MFA
  • Poetry
    • Richard Ryal
    • Sherwood Anderson
    • Mark DeCarteret
    • Dennis Hinrichsen Poetry
    • Daniel Biegelson
    • Natan Last
    • Jim Daniels Poetry
    • Michael Chang
    • D E Steward
    • Benjamin Paloff Poetry
    • David Dodd Lee
    • Isabelle Doyle
    • Kathleen Heil
    • Leonard Kress
    • Lauren Tess
    • Cesca Janece Waterfield
    • Billy Cancel Poetry
    • Scott Minar
    • Greg Glazner
    • Bruce McRae
    • Maureen Thorson
  • Fiction
    • On Experimental Fiction
    • Mark Cassidy, "How I Met My Wife"
    • Emily Trachtenberg, "Plum"
    • Hector Donovan-Gonzalez
    • Christopher Linforth, "Zia"
    • Jenessa Abrams, "You Never Wish That Upon Anyone"
    • Eros Livieratos, "On Feeling"
    • Halsted M. Bernard, "Your Hands"
    • Justin Meckes, "The Gash"
    • Reb Livingston, from "Bombyonder"
    • Craig Foltz, "Without Stigma"
  • Nonfiction
    • Martha Wiseman, "Loose Ends"
    • Jan Jolly, "Through My Father's Glasses"
    • Kristina Moriconi, "Still Looking"
    • Wm. Anthony Connolly, "IGY"
    • Cal Freeman, "Loosestrife"
    • W.F. Lantry, "The Strange Beauty of the Unfamiliar"
    • Michael Roloff, "Accretion"
    • Andrew Sunshine, "John Hancock's John Hancock"
    • Diane Payne, "3 micro memoirs"
    • Luc Sante, "Flesh and Bone"
    • Isobel O'Hare, "Failure: A Love Letter"
    • Melissa Wiley, "Barbed Wire Fence"
    • Ashley Wilkinson, "fractional distillation"
  • Art