Ben Rasnic is originally from Jonesville, a small rural town in extreme southwestern Virginia, population <1000. Currently, Ben resides in Bowie, Maryland and earns a paycheck as an accountant for a paper recycling company in Alexandria, Va. His poems have appeared in numerous online and print journals including Bird’s Eye Review, Camroc Press Review, Flutter, Gutter Eloquence, Ink, Sweat & Tears,The Orange Room Review, Quantum Poetry, Right Hand Pointing, The Rusty Truck and Short, Fast and Deadly.
Road Kill (Appalachia, Va)
streets so narrow
you can barely squeeze thru—
careless pedestrians breaking blind bargains
& parked cars scraped against sidewalk.
Young & old gather on the corner
drinking cheap red wine
from brown paper bags.
Ambition went with the bottles,
broken, tossed into the gutters
of past generations
watch as you drive by,
weaving intricate
paradigms across networks
of graveled highway,
mountain men driving drunk
& the dead by the side of the road.
