Orchard

after Gentileschi’s painting Judith Slaying Holofernes

“In Gentileschi’s [work], Holofernes is not docile and surprised like in Caravaggio’s [painting]. See his hand? He’s ripping off her blouse—even in his dying moments, he’s expressing his patriarchal control over her.” —Ethan Kinsella

Nature blinks & sees itself dismembered.
The sun first: an eye skinned red from
its socket. H tightropes blood
from our mouths, strokes this
city into a limitless plank. I walk
myself into the picture
of a lover, insects clapping
against my thighs. Ways to taffy-pull
his mind into song: with drink,
with dress. The maidservant ropes H
in her hands, oiled with
curses, and we swarm. The blade gently elbows
through the plush wrapping
of his neck, & I plunge further, dutifully, as if
scrubbing my back teeth, searching for
the hard stem buried in his throat.
Suddenly, a howl: my ear
jolts to his face, half-unscrewed.
I soften against the apple of
bone right as it cracks.

Alexa Theofanidis is a rising freshman at Harvard University. Her work either appears or is forthcoming in Birdcoat Quarterly, perhappened mag, Eunoia Review, and elsewhere. She reads poetry for COUNTERCLOCK Journal and is a 2021 Adroit Journal Mentee in poetry.