we have on display a nascent child

Jerrod Bohn

he eats his name as soon as he learns
his name is graspable but not as song
so his belly forever eats his tongue

we once considered excising his skin
but composed entirely of knuckles
he beat time on his own legs & stepped into
a circumcised world counting syllables
back into a voiceless O

he kept slipping between our fingers

so we kept him behind glass his wounds
fill as soon as they become visible
he birthed himself a skinless void

speaks through himself askless but not full
singing of a collapsed world

his hollow belly digesting his bones