Cass Donish is a queer writer from California, author of the poetry collections The Year of the Femme (University of Iowa Press, 2019), winner of the Iowa Poetry Prize, and Beautyberry (Slope Editions, 2018). Their nonfiction chapbook On the Mezzanine (Gold Line Press, 2019) was chosen by Maggie Nelson as winner of the Gold Line Press Chapbook Competition. Donish has writing appearing or forthcoming in American Poetry Review, Cincinnati Review, Colorado Review, Denver Quarterly, Gettysburg Review, Guernica, Iowa Review, jubilat, Kenyon Review, The Rumpus, Tupelo Quarterly, VICE, and elsewhere.

POETRY

Dignity

By CASS DONISH

We spooned
out avocados beside lakes, // I licked pink salt from your nape, /
drew the shapes of continents
on your back