my eyes been tired recently can’t sleep
though I seen how you wept fatigued
on the bathroom floor wet tile &
we went to your bed the dog followed
& pressed paw against belly then
sighed & snored in a rhythmic breathing
we tried to do the same
(originally published in The Virginia Normal, 2018)
Florida’s coast the horizon gunmetal
and the gales drive me into a house
where I ramble in garbled non sequiturs
about God highways marijuana to a cop
whose intent is to arrest me but he says
he does not have the authority yet
I say you’ll get there then after
the wreckage the cop works as a clerk
in the city’s only shelter I ask
if there’s room and he says not yet
(originally published in Hollow Tongue, Spring 2018)
another night of insomnia
the crickets never sleep
endlessly yapping on &
on about the planes & trains
& flightless birds who wander
fields endlessly & there
is an island where
that’s all that happens
it’s 5 A.M.
& this bed is an island
(originally published in The Sunlight Press, 2018)
we woke from something beautiful (kissing
finally alone) only two hours of sleep when melodies
from the other room infiltrate our ears we wonder
where it is we want to take ourselves / where we can
believe in magic that isn’t ours / laying on a pull-out bed
with harsh spring coils like relying on the several bottles
we drank hours before to help us wake up honesty
(originally published in FORTH Magazine, Fall 2017)
I spend most nights in the company of shadow,
a universe to toss and turn, mind wandering
in the smell of strawberry shampoo– my sheets,
familiar honey. I sleep in a crater growing deeper
without you. At night, birds are mostly silent.
The occasional siren punctuates air and I hope
you are all right, wherever you are. Without
your orbit, I wake at six and the room burns
me dry. There must be a medical reason for this:
the heart, when under sheets, overheats
but when alone becomes so cold, to sleep
too long is dangerous, and the temperature
drops to near the threshold of memory– my hair
mussed in darkness by my pillow’s imitation
of what your hands might do
if they were here, wanting to be held again.
(originally published in Freshwater Literary Journal, Spring 2017)
If you bought me a wizard hat,
I would learn magic
–to easily complete these blue pajamas
adorned with white stars, the soft and safe.
In the day we glimmer. At night–
let’s make sleep a spell, a slow
slip into lullaby, a cradle free
from disagreement, a glass of wine
to forget we inhaled the wind.
We almost floated
into the squeeze of dark. In bed
I watch cartoons in my head: Fantasia fireworks. Flames
that frame the bitter sky. Neon daisies in glowing eyes.
I dream hours researching the best tongue
to learn. The world may need a hero to
vanquish evil through fire, or ice, but all I want
is the kind of magic that keeps you warm at night,
far removed from my cold touch. The kind
where we whisper warm enchantments,
recite words which will not conjure ice.
(originally published in Switched-On Gutenberg, Summer 2016)
Paradise is worse than this. I’ve pissed
in the golden streets of Beverly Hills.
The stars depart their private cabs,
shoes on the ground. I’ve pissed in beach sand
with the waterbirds, the full balloon
at sunrise, wind swaying. The neighborhood
has my back. I spit fish fluoride
into grass. Splotches of next-day death
in circles brown and black. Windows fog. Yeah
I’m an airplane in a cloud. Should’ve wrapped that scarf
around my neck until my head fell off. The night is
a broken refrigerator, top shelf. Tell that to the rotting
trunk sushi. Still, some spiders creep through cracks and
keep the feet and urine smells out. Bent to a backseat
sockball and time is an envelope I hand to a stranger.
How his home stinks of sweat and mildew
and old Havarti. Fiona has crank windows
and that new car smell and floating dust.
I can’t spit enough. Blame it on the vermouth.
In the morning, I floss my coal moon fingernails
with flamenco strings. Neighbors run
past but who needs pants.
Say hello to the father and his
baby in the stroller. Say hello
to the fleshy whites. Say
hello to everlasting days
of luxury where the days
don’t end, the nights never
end, again and again
the fishing rod window
cranks, to invited crows–
the feasts of mud– say
hello and wave and caw.
(originally published in Prong & Posy, Issue 2)
