Words:
- Titmouse
- Tit
- Mouse
- Formica
- Honeycomb
- Axis
Ornithology
A titmouse, she said, is neither a tit nor a mouse.
A titmouse, she said, is never a flavor of cheese.
It couldn’t, she said, demolish the roof of your house.
It isn’t, she said, a honeycomb studded with bees.
What is it, I asked: a bug or a bat or a snake?
A movie, I asked? A colour? A flavor of praxis?
And was it, I asked, a-prowl when I wasn’t awake?
And could it, I asked, untether the Earth from its axis?
She would not reply. She sat at the edge of her chair.
and gave me The Eye, as hard as formica or chrome.
What is it, and why? And when will I meet it and where?
Unheeded, my cry. The gloaming of nobody home.
Alarming, unknown, it lurks like a loon or a lark
Unknowing, alone, I wait for its steps in the dark.
Mild-mannered philosophy professor by day, poet by night,
Ray Briggs teaches at Stanford University, where they also host the syndicated radio show Philosophy Talk. They are the author of the poetry collections Common Sexual Fantasies, Ruined (Cordite Press, 2016) and Free Logic (University of Queensland Press, 2013), as well as the co-author of the zine Modern American Gods, Volumes One and Two (2018, with Anna Zusman) philosophy monograph What Even Is Gender (Routledge, 2023, with B. R. George).
Anna Zusman immigrated to the United States from the former Soviet Union when she was twelve. She currently teaches drawing and illustration at Southern Arkansas University. In her artwork she questions stereotypes and conventions. Anna regularly participates in zine festivals and exhibits her art around the US. She is a creator of many art books and zines including Mermaid Heritage (2014), Men from Dating Sites: Volume 2 (2019) and Modern American Gods Volumes I and II (with Ray Briggs, 2018).
http://www.annazusman.com/
