BLANK SPACE
There are boundaries I would not touch —
some names are not mine to wear.
I know history through my ancestors’ wounds —
I have seen what happens
when language becomes a ledger.
I know the herd grows denser before slaughter.
I would not step forward — not even then.
The words are cheap, dangerously engaging.
They promise belonging at the price of breath.
I choose the blank space where I am made to answer.
I will not stand beneath inclusion
written over me.
I keep it blank —
under any demand for alignment.
I will not step into a place assigned before I arrive.
I arrive unnamed.
OLEG OLIZEV is a Siberian-born American poet and writer. His recent work has appeared in Heavy Feather Review, The Plentitudes, Panorama, ALOCASIA, OFIC Magazine, Cathexis Northwest, Stone of Madness Press, BULL, Night Picnic, The Ana, Audience Askew, The Argyle, Half and One, and Thorn & Bloom, among others. He lives in New York City.
See more by Oleg Olizev:
Four poems in the Heavy Feather Review
Poem in The Plentitudes
Nonfiction in Panorama