Animals: “I’VE SEEN MANY KINDS OF ROADKILL” by Arah Ko
I’VE SEEN MANY KINDS OF ROADKILL
But I’m not going to tell
you about any of them. Instead, I’ll confess
it was 11:53 PM in sauce-sticky seat that a boy first
told me women should obey men. I stared
at his face, then the sleepy cars as they shuffled
through the drive-through. I wish
I could say he wasn’t serious, or that I slapped
his lukewarm face. But he just squeezed (Mild)
on a soft-shell taco as I watched
a raccoon pick apart trash across the parking lot
her small hands searching through the darkness
for something precious.
And she found it—lifting fingers full
of ground beef and cheddar, as if in thanks
to some lost god of parking lots and taco
chains, of the joy of twenty
lost bucks found at the bottom of a pocket.
I’ll tell you how badly I wanted
to be her, so free in the humid
shadows, to want something so savagely,
and to take it in my own tiny hands. I’ll tell
you not to stay stuck to your greasy
orange chair at a fast food joint. Instead,
just leave. Be like that greedy trash
panda, so beautiful to me. Her gray
fur trembling against black asphalt, face tipped
to the stars, nose crumpling as she chewed.
About Arah Ko
Arah Ko is a writer from Hawai'i and the author of Brine Orchid (YesYes Books 2025) and the chapbook Animal Logic (Bull City Press 2025). Her work is published or forthcoming in American Poetry Review, Ninth Letter, The Threepenny Review, New Ohio Review, and elsewhere. She is pursuing her Ph.D. in creative writing at the University of Cincinnati. Arah is currently on staff at Surging Tide Magazine. Catch her at arahko.com.
