When revisiting my life's anatomy
In waking and more often,
beneath closed lids
Statues rise like charging knights
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Liam Kelley scratches at a blotch of dirt in his parents’ backyard—by the flower bed and the old tree stump. By the fence that collapsed last time it snowed and his father—Bill Kelley—was out of town. Liam lives at home and, in exchange for help with attorney fees, has agreed to fix things around the house.
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I felt it before I saw it.
Warm, wet, right between my legs as I was in a meeting with clients. We were talking about how much revenue they made from X campaigns and how the email open rates were—a realm of life that wasn’t real
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The room smells like smoke, wet and dewy like lime and soil. Something primal is here. It's quiet but with a low beat circulating around us, droning in the background, like we're in a whale's stomach
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I picked up a lipstick and buried it
In my dirty old coat
Which I couldn’t replace
Til I started bagging groceries
That was the first time
I planned on being invincible
And cruel
Can you imagine the feel of a car on black ice? Have you ever stepped off an edge, expecting solid ground and finding only air? Could you pick that panicked stomach drop out of a lineup?
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You have made it exactly 43 minutes into your Wednesday morning before that bold wardrobe choice becomes a familiar lament.
White? Haven’t you learned?
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I am the artist and my body is my canvas
You are what you eat, so
I am a few bags of vegan gummy bears
Considered for too long
For the first decade of my life, it was something I rarely noticed. It was just a part of me, like my unruly hair, blue eyes and pigeon-toed gait. However, once I started middle school, the blemish could no longer be ignored.
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Often, like visiting the quietest chamber of some empty church / I turn out my pockets on a long winding walk
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“If it fell in there, it's yours now,” she said matter of factly, staring past the necklace dangling from my fingers, saying as much with her eyes as her words.
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There are few things cuter, and sadder, than a mouse’s unaware butt inside a mouse trap that you’ve caught him in…
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Sitting here, facing a blinking cursor on a blank page, the nail of my ring finger robotically picks at the nail fold of my thumb like a metronome. After I get a bit of traction in the flesh, I switch to the sharper tool of my first finger, which is slightly serrated thanks to a sloppy bite a few hours back, or perhaps yesterday. I don't need to look at my hands to work an itch.
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In splatters of oil—hot wax covering the body from head-to-toe, and you still work reception without screaming—the lamplight badly hitting your shorts or movie star shoes—burn after wearing. Burn after marring. (Burn after first sign of a mistake.)
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I never like the stale feeling
Of a poem that doesn't pick up the pace,
Photo by Rebecca Hannigan
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The bad days still come on fast as summer storms—violent and unannounced. They might be beautiful if I could find shelter. The air clings to me like drying blood, the empty edges blur and the space around my body shakes. My breath comes in gasps, no longer natural, but consciously made. Each inhale is a decision to live. Have you ever felt a code red in your bones?
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They are south of Castle Rock—I mean, Colorado Springs. They should have stayed another
Night. They’re saying Castle Rock’s gotten six inches, which is actually—see, the Mountains I think were fine. Like—deep in the mountains. I do remember in my youth—
I am told to work it out
Work out my impossible questions?
Work it out. Your circus of dreams
Your day in day out
Years in years out
Submitted without comment
I’d like to submit
A request for wishful thinking
what is this on the couch what is this
kind of stain like coffee like really what could this be maybe the