the wax paper

Zack Rogow


is the queasiness

when you’re about to land

and you realize that this flight

with its snow mountain geodes

and its looking-glass lakes

this flight

which could have taken you anywhere

is actually going to drum down

in one certain city

where cars ghost along the artery

and families with wounded microwaves

and actual names sleep

in those dollhouses beyond the runway

and your life is not all lives

but only the best one

you can reach

in the time you have

Zack Rogow is the author, editor, or translator of twenty books and plays. His play, Colette Uncensored, had a staged reading at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. and ran at The Marsh in San Francisco in 2016-17. He teaches in the low-residency MFA, University of Alaska, Anchorage.