poem
Updated: Oct 15
by K.M. Hanslik
Flood
After a while, I catered myself
to the bandits, the refugees
the ones who spoke “mother”
like a tongueless word, built
empires in the mouths of
their fathers, brought forth ideas
like plagues. I gathered them in
a faceless desert yet becoming
itself. I bent each of these
roughened men's prayers
into shapes I could reckon with.
To each I asked “what were you called
before you were homed?”
And they answered in hooves,
in horns and the dense blood
of body. Their tongues which could
not speak suddenly loosed like
torrential rain upon a territory which,
having been newly formed,
did not yet recognize a flood.
K.M. Hanslik is a writer and editor from Ohio whose work focuses on grief, transformation, and finding purpose. Her debut book of poetry, Bones: Poems on Reclamation was published in 2026 (Riverstone Press). Her poems have been featured in Rust & Moth, wildscape lit, Half Mystic, Bleating Thing Magazine, Dishsoap Quarterly, and elsewhere. Find her online @kmhanslik or at www.kmhanslik.com.