Poem of the Week

Last Supper

Virginia Konchan

Big Brother, Big Data, Big Tech:
I honestly can’t tell them apart,
but I love this thing. When this
thing breaks, I want another thing
just like this one. Big feels. Huge.
What is theory but a recurring
wanton thought, what selfhood
but a hammer seeking a nail?
Protect me from what I want:
domination, at my own hand.
I live here but don’t live here,
like a child in a swivel chair,
feet suspended in midair.
I would sink lower, slouch,
but distress is performative,
motion a Gothic melodrama
in a postfactual stimulus culture
beset by a centurial hiring freeze
wherein transcendence is had by
overcoming what made us human:
living and its inflationary costs.
Let the record show my failures:
muscles, tissues, tendons, blood,
a dwelling place none can afford.
This is my body, a repo market.
Prepare thee the way of the Lord.

Virginia Konchan is the author of four poetry collections, Bel Canto (Carnegie Mellon, 2022), Hallelujah Time (Véhicule Press, 2021), and Any God Will Do and The End of Spectacle (Carnegie Mellon, 2020, 2018) as well as a short story collection, Anatomical Gift.
Originally published:
February 2, 2022

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