Marcus Wicker is the acclaimed author of three poetry collections: Dear Mothership (2026), Silencer (2017), and Maybe the Saddest Thing (2012), which was selected by D.A. Powell for the National Poetry Series. His many honors include fellowships from the Harvard Radcliffe Institute and the National Endowment for the Arts, the Poetry Society of America’s Lyric Poetry Award, a Pushcart Prize, a Ruth Lilly Fellowship, and additional fellowships from the Fine Arts Work Center and Cave Canem. Wicker’s poems have appeared in The Nation, The New Republic, The Atlantic, Oxford American, and POETRY. He currently teaches in the MFA program at the University of Memphis.
But you made every
delicate, elegant wrist
& glistening ankle.
But you made them
beautiful
in braided rope
& dime store gold.
But you made every
necklace clasp.
But you made them
caress the nape
like an errant wind
after a shower.
But you made every
eyelash erotic. Every
single strand of hair
soft.
But you made them
from dust & bone.
Made every glorious
singing thigh. Every
button nose.
But you made them
with holes—
wide open
to the faintest hints
of salt
in a sea breeze, salt
in the sweaty mouth
of a navel, salt
in the blood, sweet
in every wrong way.
Source: Poetry (November 2011).
