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# Two Poems by Jessica Laser
- URL: https://hyperallergic.com/two-poems-by-jessica-laser/
- Published: 2017-01-11T12:02:43.000Z
- Updated: 2025-11-24T16:41:35.000Z
- Description: Our poetry editor, Wendy Xu, has selected two poems by Jessica Laser for her monthly series that brings original poetry to the screens of Hyperallergic readers.
- Author: Wendy Xu
- Tags: Poetry, Hyperallergic Poetry, #wp, #wp-post, #image-position-hidden, #Import 2025-11-24 07:23 (2016, 2017, part 2)

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2017/01/agk-bed-front-large.jpg)

## The Fish That Are the Whale

In the depression between two hills,  
We rode at a walk. Gentlemen,  
As you were, don’t you see  
Your fear came true? Life is not as cruel as you  
And the crueler you consider life, the crueler you’ll be.

We agree. I understand you completely  
But I don’t understand the way you treat me.  
The people I’ve treated this way  
I haven’t loved. I don’t understand  
How you can love me the way you treat me.

In the patch of grass behind your house,  
A neighbor crouched and waited.  
We rode from the North and I said hi.  
I had nothing to hide, though like a new bride  
Or a cold one, I had covered myself with a sheet.

Where we rode, truth tellers hadn’t heard of a lie.  
They believed instead in delayed rhymes:  
*I can see your lips and eyes moving, but no words* 
*Exit your mouth. Finally you tell me your thought.* 
*By that time, it no longer rhymes.*

We rode up and down and life kept pace,  
Everyone me or a postcard  
From a faraway place. Croatians  
Called me “America the Beautiful”  
But I prefer gorgeous.

## In the Depression between Two Hills

Replacing myself into the calm  
Seated body patiently awaiting  
My replacement, I had recurring  
Dreams that ended with me  
Sitting up suddenly

In my bed, still in the dream,  
From which I woke  
Suddenly and sat up frightened  
Of the repetition, as if of a glitch  
Or a stutter.

It’s like a stutter, my awareness,  
Two sounds where  
There should be one,  
But two sounds  
In awareness of their oneness.

In awareness of their oneness,  
We rode at a walk. Gentlemen,  
You talk too slow. You have  
No sleeve to wipe your nose  
And when the dawn breaks

Its colors upon you,  
Which shall you absorb?  
For men are pregnant all the time  
With information.  
Some with wisdom.

\* \* \*

Jessica Laser is the author of two chapbooks: [*He That Feareth Every Grass Must Not Piss in a Meadow* ](http://jessicalaser.com/page/2-A-Chapbook.html?ref=hyperallergic.com)(paradigm press, 2016) and [*Assumed Knowledge and the Knowledge Assumed from Experience*](http://jessicalaser.com/page/1-A-Chapbook.html?ref=hyperallergic.com) (Catenary Press, 2015). Her poems have appeared in *Boston Review, The Iowa Review, Lana Turner, jubilat, Prelude* and elsewhere. A graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, she teaches writing at Parsons School of Design.

*Readers are encouraged to submit 3–5 poems as a PDF to Wendy Xu for consideration at* [*poetry@hyperallergic.com*](mailto:poetry@hyperallergic.com)*.*