The House of Earthly Delights // Front Door // Exterior Front Panels
Sophia Chong | Poetry
after Hieronymus Bosch
Who knew god
ate at 7-Eleven, so prosaic
beside neon taquitos.
He sold
out, moved upstate
to golf in polos, swig
Diet Coke, dream
of Gandalf and gold rings
as we built him
another shrine.
He stashed
sweets in his pockets,
beckoned to the little
girls, taught us
the danse macabre:
stretched our legs
apart, planted arbors
with our arched backs,
instructed us to mirror
his mouth, knew
how small we were.
I’ll never forgive you.
Sophia Chong is a queer writer. A finalist for the Jake Adam York Prize and a semifinalist for the Adrienne Rich Award for Poetry, their poetry has appeared/is forthcoming in Beloit Poetry Journal, The Massachusetts Review, Black Warrior Review, among other places. Their criticism has appeared/is forthcoming in The Adroit Journal, Seneca Review, and fugue. They hold an MFA in poetry from Rutgers University-Newark.