“Evolution” is one of two brilliantly biting poems by Francine Witte in our Winter 2017 issue.

{ X }

FIRST, THE APE,
paw-digits poking
at sticks.  Monkeybrain
seemed to want
a fire.

Later, early
man.  Thin coat
of intelligence against
the cold.  Someone stumbled,

flint against rock
and sparkshower tumbled
into the unlanguaged night.

Now, there’s us.
Filthy with fires
and bloated with words.
We are scorched with war
and we say nothing.

Future man
looks back on us
and shivers.

{ X }

FRANCINE WITTE is a poet, flash fiction writer, photographer, blogger, and reviewer.  Her latest chapbook, Not All Fires Burn the Same won the 2016 Slipstream Press annual competition and has just been published by them.  She is a former English teacher and lives in Manhattan.