By Karla Reimert
Translated by Patty Nash
On the way home sucking on bribes.
Nothing in the city to buy
I could ever need.
I want to go to the playground later, dangle
ambitiously in the hollows of my knees. Rods thick as thumbs,
parting me like a breach. I swing, think
head-first. Grass grows under me.
I pluck it with my mouth.
Karla Reimert is a German poet. Her first book, Picknick mit Schwarzen Bienen (Picknick with Black Bees), was published in 2014 and won the Berlin Literaturwerkstatt’s Prize for Best Debut. Reimert has won the Würth Poetry Prize, the Rheinsberg author forum prize, and the Essay Prize for the Japanese Consulate.
Patty Nash is a poet and translator. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in New Delta Review, Juked, Prelude, and elsewhere. She is an MFA candidate in poetry at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. She tweets at @pattynashdj.
