How did you know you were a god?

TOMASELLI AWARD, Winner

POETRY

by Irena Marsalek

i knew it when she let me touch her

and my bones did not snap - there

were only the swallows perched over

the horizon, poised for migration,

and the psalm of fear they whispered

while i laid my hand atop her chest,

listening to the world pulse in tandem

to our trepidation. still, i held on, and my

back did not break with burden, so we

kept pretending we were loving

without a black hole forming inside us.