ALICE FULMER-ZELINKA

October Workshop Poem
TO CATHY LINH CHE

a. I am aware that the Tower is falling,

but it housed a prison – in breach

the convictions were set free – yours &

mine – in the electrical fire (which is in

the heart) spun out of cowardice.

Water won’t put out the war. Convicts

held – now free – off to the Heaven not

far away but here with us. As twins we

elongate the spine, where souvenirs are

stored between the jelly. Don’t forget

your blood, sugar

b. In the cave there is a screen

in a rave I feel the weight

& measures of this state

collapsing in on its self.

3, 2, 1, 0 how can I escape?

“If they did not spare him

what will they do to us?”

The disciples pose & Mary roasts

their asses. This will end,

and its close. Closer than you know,

the end of school. It sounds

cheugy but: this too will pass.

Flags will burn as flowers bloom.

Pesto primavera red and green

leaves from the future.

Alice Fulmer-Zelinka is a poetess and PhD candidate at UCSB in English. She studies medieval poetry and contemporary intersections regarding gender and sexuality. In 2020, a manuscript of hers received an honorable mention from the Academy of American Poets’s University and College Poetry Prize, for UCLA’s Fred and Edith Herman Memorial Prize. Her debut poetry collection Faunalia (2023) came out on Sul Books (an imprint of Aeon Books, UK). Other poetry publications include new words {press}, Ultraviolet Books, the Sul Books Journal, fifth wheel press, Tyger Quarterly, and various undergraduate journals, with poems forthcoming in FENCE. She is the co-host of a rising star podcast in medieval studies, which focuses on Chaucer's Canterbury Tales and pop culture: Cunterbury. It is available on major streaming platforms.