2010
"Arachnid Disco" by Deanna Larsen examines how illness can pin us down, put us on display. This is a piece about surrender, the temporary loss of agency represented as quivering and floating, lost in webs and water. I love Larsen's juxtaposition of medical language and nature: the “locust swarm orchestra” in the lungs, the “bloodletters in a sterile sky.” A deftly woven textile of spiders and sickness, we are shown how the purpose of stinging needles is complex; we observe both the hurt and heal of our physical experiences and the tension between our body and the forces that act upon it. - Susan Slaviero.
"arachnid disco" by Deanna Larsen
I'm a spider floating in a glass of water
I'm a gypsy moth quivering in a web
doctors flutter
under my skin
bloodletters in a sterile sky
the locust swarm orchestra
hums deep in my lungs
exoskeleton fiddles
plucking IVs
antennae inch down
my mosquito net mouth
Black Widows
suck the Katydid dry
the nurse's coat twists around her waist
dragonfly wings in a storm drain
her scorpion needle poised
that hornet stings me
back to life
I'm a gypsy moth quivering in a web
doctors flutter
under my skin
bloodletters in a sterile sky
the locust swarm orchestra
hums deep in my lungs
exoskeleton fiddles
plucking IVs
antennae inch down
my mosquito net mouth
Black Widows
suck the Katydid dry
the nurse's coat twists around her waist
dragonfly wings in a storm drain
her scorpion needle poised
that hornet stings me
back to life
Susan Slaviero's "Spirit Photo" in Issue #8.
Susan Slaviero is the author of CYBORGIA (Mayapple Press), Selections from the Murder Book (Treelight Books), and A Wicked Apple (Hyacinth Girl Press). Her work has appeared in Arsenic Lobster, Jet Fuel Review, Rhino, Story Magazine and other publications. She lives and writes in the south suburbs of Chicago.
Susan Slaviero is the author of CYBORGIA (Mayapple Press), Selections from the Murder Book (Treelight Books), and A Wicked Apple (Hyacinth Girl Press). Her work has appeared in Arsenic Lobster, Jet Fuel Review, Rhino, Story Magazine and other publications. She lives and writes in the south suburbs of Chicago.
