This month, the 141st Moon Prize goes to Martyna C. Miller's spellbinding poem "On a Train Between Boroughs."


ON A TRAIN BETWEEN BOROUGHS

by Martyna C. Miller


you’ll think of a small painting
you couldn't afford
at a winter market
and you’ll see
Venus riding the MTA.

Tonight it looks exactly like it.
The plush bathrobe falling away from the globe
of a blemished shoulder.

While peeling porous citrus with burgundy nails
popping the tiny pockets of pulp,
the sweets fill the cart.
Along with her, fawning, spilling desires
like hot coffee on sticky nora.
Dashed tailored suits and vests                                                                         
gleaming eyes
and whiskered casual carnivores
blow the bugle horn
starting the hounds on an unbarred track.

What if I could sew the cloud to the sky to stop its relentless drift?

The sky has turned to the innards of a blueberry pie
and I’ve just remembered the laundry.
The needles fall through the couture left outside
sewing them down to the earth
and the beating breasts of geese
leave a running stitch in the sky.

I’ve seen
the way a spider fractures the air with its long web
shattered mirrors slivers of silver.

I’m back at the winter market
trying to bargain with the man for the moon again.


* * * * *

Martyna C. Miller, a native of Brooklyn, NY, graduated from Brooklyn College with degrees in Creative Writing and Linguistics. Her work has appeared in college-run publications such as The Junction Magazine and Stuck In The Library. In addition to writing poetry, she is currently working on her debut dystopian surrealist novel. When not writing, she can often be found maintaining her fish tanks.