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Self Portrait as Amoeba(E)

By Julie Benesh

Illustration by Albert M . Nikhla

call me invisible    sexless    ancient   quaint    cute     irrelevant    throwback   basic   

            overlook me    a small too beautiful   for this world’s    naked eyes

      a   c o l o r l e s s  blob       orthotic fake feet    beneath transparent caftan   

       I shape-shift         simplicity my gift         binary, I split / we split           a battalion 

             of identical                 mothers/daughters/sisters/aunts

               who live for the future     working our way

           up from this life’s           one-celled existence

like seamstresses         we mend/we mend/we mend    faster than we rend

       You once were us (theoretically immortal                        simpletons)      one day we will be       you

    (complex and vulnerable mutations                         just off the evolutionary bus)

            For now we wait          in the damp wet           consume  

what’s there      chew water     sip on air          like the smuggest Buddhist nuns         we purge          our excess            to retain our girlish frames      and yet en masse can mess

       you up in your incubator-gut        that second brain

or eat up your first one               (mom-muddled)        so please          go ahead

don’t mind       insignificant                 us


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Posted On: December 17, 2024
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