Innocent
by Allyn Bernkopf
minds blank and bustle around a cracked corner in Red Light Ogden. Hags or whores flick tongues at muscles behind diesel steering wheels
and pit their pocked bodies against each other for that wad of green. Paper throats and hips hum for that booze and those
leg tangled nights red with forgotten children and wire hangers.
That child, with the cuppy sight, who saunters to her mother’s boyfriend
wanting just one more taste of his bubble gum. Her mother pussy-foots the diesel, hiking crystal rims for her next fix while cozen lips
suck down on brazen-cocked souls, grinning.
Allyn Bernkopf received a bachelor’s degree from Utah State University in creative writing and poetry. She is currently studying her MA in poetry at Weber State University in Ogden, Utah. She enjoys poetry, Mother Earth, her two cats, reading, writing, laughing, red wine, family, friends, running and Netflix.