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"Whopper." Courtesy of Guy Mendes

In Defense of Poetry Voice

Like a lark    lift        into moonlight.    Like          the muzzle
of a gun    I      should have raised.      Like NPR.
  Like the joyride           in an elevator               by two teens

with child.                   Like a child. Like whining.      Like a flag
on a mailbox. Like a skateboard                        off a ramp. Like a
piano   to the fourth floor. Like Armageddon. Like    you      like

someone,        not light but deep,    so deeply    light descends
    and     when they are not in bed     you can       only sing       to
the night,                         babe?                   Like a poem,

which    is          only a box.
Like   a    brass   ring

When                      a plaster    horse                           jumps.
 Like                    the rapture. 
    Like                 a chapel’s ceiling.
              Like       the eyes              of the                     dead.


Listen to David Tomas Martinez read “In Defense of Poetry Voice”

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David Tomas Martinez

David Tomas Martinez has received fellowships from Bread Loaf and CantoMundo, and his work has appeared in Poets & Writers, Publishers Weekly, NPR, NBC Latino, and BuzzFeed. Martinez released Hustle, his first collection, with Sarabande Books earlier this year.