no more dog for you

is what kailee says after
our boss says bang! dead
he asks who wouldn’t have
shot a dog that’s clearly at
its end and she walks out
of his office sits down by me
and says he was showing
me grotesque pictures
and I said I know
I overheard half his
ear is gone
I still have two
full ears
though sometimes
selectively choose
what I perceive as
in their conversation
as in yes I know
I hung the wifi
password sign
in his office
slightly slanted
and I have
a diagonal view
of it from the
wooden table
I call my desk and
it irks me to see
slight
imperfection
I would not
could not
invest in the
thought of
owning a gun
but I
will tear down
that sign
at first
opportunity

(originally published in Jokes Review, Summer 2020)

Cape May Karaoke

vocals rise  night static  the beach house we
sway to midi music   call ourselves karaoke

machines   what disappointment   to not be
whole   humid June   familiar shadows

encroach the move  I crack my song  an egg
to thee   to thaw cold exhibitions of the

bottle  another  popped  Corona to thirst
for grand experiences  cheaply    the tide

a tape loop   I do not sing the steady
hand of a lyric    but rather the water

(originally published in Sybil Journal, Summer 2020)

x (miss)

                       sunlight

                          was
                          dust
              through open window

                      hardcover
                 books    wrapped
                beneath  a  plastic
                         tree

                   gifts like that

                 we did not open

(originally published in EgoPHobia, Fall 2019)

In Another Life I Am Content Enough

What simulation’s numb you ask
if I want children this time

definitive we boil Kraft mac
and cheese. I toss our meager sweet

potatoes in oil and ramble about financial
self-worth the oven nearly at four hundred

degrees. I can’t stop petting your shoulder
the ashy cat roams in the loam of our love

our newly swept hardwood the house
our home for now so limited already

steam from the inside a pressure
cooker of different timelines. What river

these converging lives to seek meaning
in the biological job postings some of us

are born to call. My dad was sixty-one
when I was born my grandfather clock

ticks nonexistent. We have gorged in all
our broken cabinets to rustle the blue

plastic grocery bag pile. I can’t stand
to live another day preoccupied.

(originally published in Flights, Summer 2021)

Blurry

Home is a little bit blurry.
Mom, I swear to you, it might not be
July next time I see you.

Your digital face is a little bit blurry,
but our lighthouse will always be
the one light in dark through memory,

right? I want to climb the ladder
to surveil the roof. Home has
become a wall of atrophied faces.

(originally published in The Writing Disorder, Summer 2021)

I am waiting for my habits to change

but I keep bingeing the same drinks.
Fireball, Tito’s, more and more–
I tap my feet, wait by the window
for the workweek to end to meet
unknowns at bars. I blackout blind
myself into the mistakes I always
make– my legs pressed against yours
in the Lyft, I want to say I don’t want
tonight to be a ghost that haunts us,
but I don’t move. I don’t say anything.

 

(originally published in Datura, Fall 2019)