I can’t sit at the dining table
& listen to the morning swarm
of words buzzing around my hair
hovering not entering my ears
(this tablecloth of hardened rice
& wide-angled magenta lotus flowers).
To come home is to steam tradition
& I admit love is a dry chunk of it.
But my patience does not endure.
The turkey in the oven has been
dressed with salt & oil since 3 A.M.
Soon we will eat our wounds.
(originally published in Pandemonium Journal, Spring 2021)
Voice sings through static
in the dark.
God forgive
me my body–
jumbled
chirping syllables.
One at a time. Heartbeat
crinkling in a sugarpacket.
Sand on beach.
I’m thankful. No one
inside
but you.
She asks what you want.
Ministerial. Ocean
breeze
through open
window. Flat stale wall.
What do I need?
More salt, more salt, more salt,
amen.
(originally published in Punk Monk Magazine, Summer 2019)
in the warehouse, cigarette
smoke sweat-drenched hours
of existence you need
to find the fruit hanging on
the balance of a day I crumple
balls of soft into paper
stones to throw vast arcs
into distant garbage cans
yelling Kobe! just to miss
an opportunity of rare self-
satisfaction in repetition
my mechanical hands must
make mistakes they are
unable to elsewhere
(originally published in COG Magazine, Spring 2019)
Wednesday, when you cashed me
out at the end of a delivery shift,
you asked if I believed in astrology,
and I said yes because you’re cute.
You said it was okay to blame
what goes wrong on the planet
closest to the sun, since it’s now
rotating in reverse. So I did.
That day, my GPS struggled
to calibrate my position, couldn’t
guide me in the proper direction.
And in the evening, I drank
myself toward sickness
at a radio station bar
to an out-of-tune band
led by a narcissistic
salesman in his sixties.
Just the week before I had
promised myself I wouldn’t
get blackout drunk again
nor lust for a person
that wasn’t my partner.
But when I woke it was
on an unfamiliar tile floor,
staring at the toilet, full
of old beer. I reached up
to tug the handle, to see
what next would spin away.
(originally published in Abandon Journal, Fall 2021)