Skip to content →

Animal Brain

Cobalt blue the sky I raise, 
I reach my eyes to. Following the long
flights of single leaves, latecomers
to December’s stubbly green. A leaf
vanishes above the chimney. Don’t badger me
for deeper meaning. Not today,
animal brain. It’s worse enough listening
to the ultrasonic vocalizations
of rats. Examining the infanticidal habits
of mountain gorillas for meaning. Better to be extinct
than a part of this human species. I wish you
would take me out so completely O Lord my God.
I wish You would switch off my lizard brain.
I don’t want to have to think
if he was right to leave his wife and family.
Sin in infancy, argues Augustine. Sin from day one,
ground zero, sin synonymous with being,
sin with knowing, sin with breathing,
sin with wanting, sin with touching,
sin with feeling, sin with me.   

Cameron Morse was diagnosed with a glioblastoma in 2014. With a 14.6-month life expectancy, he entered the creative writing program at UMKC and, in 2018, graduated with an M.F.A. His poems have been published in numerous magazines, including New LettersBridge EightPortland Review, and South Dakota Review. His first poetry collection, Fall Risk, won Glass Lyre Press’s 2018 Best Book Award. His latest is Baldy (Spartan Press, 2020). He lives with his wife Lili and son Theodore in Blue Springs, Missouri, where he serves as poetry editor for Harbor Review

Issue 18 >