Sonnet in which we remain foolishly hopeful (or, obituary for the top soil)


I am forever concerned

for the quality of the breast milk

I’ll never make. My partner and I, are out

here, in the sun, gardening in our ugly human suits

and lusting the next produce. We take the temperature

of each bell pepper, each tomato, and we hope for a healthy

harvest. We are always hoping for the best. But humans

have sent all their worst inventions straight into

the soil. You can taste the plastic before

it’s even grown, before it’s even

melting in your mouth.

Kayleb Rae Candrilli is the author of What Runs Over with YesYes Books, which was a 2017 finalist for the Lambda Literary Award in transgender poetry. Their second collection, All the Gay Saints, won the 2018 Saturnalia Book Contest and is forthcoming in Spring 2020. Candrilli is published or forthcoming in TriQuarterly Review, Cream City Review, Bettering American Poetry, and many others.