Traversing the Mid-Atlantic Ridge

In Iceland, the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates meet and diverge below and above ground

My boots pick between mossy masses of magma. They em- 
body the enjambed jumble, the janky bamboo spine that 
is an illogical, sunken viaduct. On either side,

not without geological drama, tectonic plates are
a rib cage protecting another kind of
house: a lung filled with lava, a gallbladder leaky

but determined to retain its stones and bile, 
a stomach ballooning with acid. Arms like a clothes
hanger, I long to touch both riven plates at once

for luck or posterity but they rise and overshadow 
my small self. Underwater, I could greet their seismic
skin with my palms, but I already shake too much 

to attempt a dive at Silfra Fissure, and fear the dark
drape of that landscape. There lies the fist-clench of ice 
from which I once escaped. Here rips the fire that spit me free.

An American sentence acrostic

JEN KARETNICK

A 2024 National Poetry Series finalist, Jen Karetnick is the author of twelve collections of poetry, including Inheritance with a High Error Rate (January 2024), the winner of the 2022 Cider Press Review Book Award. Forthcoming books include What Forges Us Steel: The Judge Judy Poems (Alternating Current Press, 2025) and Domiciliary (Sheila-Na-Gig Editions, 2026). See jkaretnick.com.