I am done with dating
apps. I would like to make
you dinner: salmon, rice,
brussels sprouts. You said
you know what I want
for my birthday over a bed
of nigiri and leaves. I rolled
sushi once in a cavern
of doubt. I couldn’t stop
shaking. The nervousness–
I mean, the lust– grew
on your vines by
your side door.
We had your home
re-keyed, then there was
trouble with the locks.
Couldn’t keep the lovers out.
(originally posted in Discretionary Love, 2025)
I’m no fan of gore
nor button mashers,
but when you speak to me
as if from pixelated reality
get over here and finish
me, I equip my knit cap
and fight sub-zero temperatures
to be under sheets with you
in all the fatalities
of the heart. We die
many times in each
other’s arms
inputting
the proper combinations.
We are reckless
when we love– we attack,
we defend, I watch
the blood flush out of us
asking if you will love me
always. When that lands,
I’m finished.
(originally published in Stickman Review, Fall 2023)
If someone jumped I’d jump
into the warm whatever of mid-
May
I’d not leap as the
maneuver’s overused– I understand
these liminal expectations from
poetry
if I haven’t quite mastered
the rudimentary mechanics
of swimming. I am the sediment
from a different continent rising
to you as loam scraping against
sand. You said wave, I said wind.
The red tide carried us. Whatever.
We ended at Point B. The alternate
universe if you’d call it that.
But I said the stop sign.
I said all kinds of things
as you drove through
ocean construction.
(originally published in Roi Faneant, Fall 2023)
And my eyeballs
are on fire.
I used to like the sound
of a brush in flames,
and this is the same
thing. The burning
beneath me,
molten soil.
Running is my prerogative,
but my heart has to be
a certain way,
not not.
(originally published in Monologging, Winter 2024)
shielded from torrential downpour I count each privilege
in the rain the mailman with the bad knee runs up our
stairs to deliver corporate marketing I sit in my
comfort watching heavy mist float float off the parked
cars and wonder as the sidewalk’s sea level
rises is this a flash flood? then it lets up when it
resumes intensity I wonder if this is hurricane weather
this is Pittsburgh this is no hurricane though Laura
makes her journey up the Gulf Coast another storm in
a sky of storms I observe seemingly unlimited
(originally published in Poetica, Spring 2024)
I am shirtless. I am thirsty.
I drink an eternity
from my full glass of water
while my two friends kiss.
In the old house. The kitchen
with the steel island
I had lifted my glass
from. New lovers!
I stand
by the sink
filling my glass,
over and over
again, the faucet
a waterfall,
bountiful,
something like love–
it quenches,
but you must keep filling.
(originally published in BlazeVOX, Spring 2024)
I could be walking
on water down
the beach minding
my own business
a heron Jesus
and still at the splash
of your all
encompassing wingspan
I would not know
the difference
between a wave
and awash
(originally published in Avalon Literary Review, Summer 2024)
Black wig and grimebrown,
reach your hand to my hand.
Mimic a person (sooner and
sooner no one remembers) in
pretend interaction (if I could
color wry smiles I would
cover the world). Your old
dweller hobbles to mine,
withered from the silence.
We guess at the true age
of this era (graininess
invisible and anxious).
This is no old film.
Stuffed in sneakers, we act
through dilapidated cotton
(too far away, too tight a fit).
Let us breathe.
(originally published in The Globe Review, Summer 2023)
Food being energy–
that I eat and feel sleepy
is some sick joke. God
the jester in
his birthday suit,
blowing out the
candles
in the unlit
universe,
this small corner
of it, anyway,
where
I have turned
my back
on everything.
(originally published in Taj Mahal Review, Fall 2023)
I look for the endless
tunnel highway of light
if I see the golden
triangle pointing east
painting the far wall
spilling into another bucket
you are close enough to okay
(originally published in Poetry Super Highway, Fall 2024)