Sarah Sala
The News
Today federal officials apprehended
an undocumented brain tumor
and transported her to a detention center.
45 declared: We’re getting really bad dudes
out of this country. And at a rate that nobody’s
ever seen before. And they’re the bad ones.
For weeks, my brain crashed through the waterblack
basement of alternate galaxies before coming
to a halt on my pillow.
This tumor and I, we share the same name.
You have a beautiful brain, my neurologist beamed.
A printout of alpha waves trailed across his legs.
See that gap? That’s where you blinked!
In the Old French, to deport is to be patient.
What is language, but the genesis of crime?
45’s vice his tongue: to drive out by order.
I feel dizzy, with pain. Heavy eyes. Nausea.
The tongue is not always responsive.
Sarah Sala is the author of The Ghost Assembly Line (Finishing Line Press , 2016). Her poem “Hydrogen” was recently featured in the “Elements” episode of NPR’s hit show Radiolab in collaboration with Emotive Fruition. Sarah’s poems appear in Atlas Review, The Stockholm Review of Literature, and Poetry Ireland Review, among others. Visit her at SarahSala.com
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