mosquito in the wind I itch my heavy
soil in the little dynamite world I in-
habit the ghost of some nonsense
brioche a thunderclap stumbling
down the wedding aisle in front
of family some worlds you never
lie about but break you must
pinch the nerve that binds you
and open the gold hole to the
masses that want to help. let them.
(originally published in Bindweed Magazine, Summer 2023)
Shuffleboard in Tampa is sliding into the DMs
of a box of saltines and eating each stack whole
if you dominate otherwise you drink leftover
juice from a friend’s friends’ wedding while
waiting for what you wanted forever on
the coast of happiness the cusp of sweet
custard overflowing with berries.
(originally published in The Waiting Room, Summer 2023)
Clink your skull against my skull.
Tulip glasses in the fog at a winery.
The pale white of a wedding dress–
you wouldn’t call me Western,
would you? I’m warm at the brain
center. Leave your soft red mark
on my red mark so we can walk
slowly in the grass toward the fence
that keeps a single deciduous tree
beside the blue barn where chickens
are kept against their wild wills.
(originally published in impspired, Fall 2021)
I was asked to write a poem
to read at your wedding.
I have been writing for weeks.
I don’t know what I’m trying to do
but I know it’s something new.
Mostly the poem has become my life.
Mostly it’s a poem of longing
for what the poem in me longs for.
Mostly it is a poem of the fight between desire
and desire.
Mostly it is a poem of desire
from the poem’s point of view.
Maybe the poem is a poem of love.
Though like most loves, the poem is a little
exasperated.
The poem seems at the moment
to be in the middle of a struggle.
The poem says the poem is struggling.
The poem says it wants more
than this.
The poem wants to try and try again.
The poem wants you
to write a new poem for it.
It hopes it will then write a new
vow.
I don’t know why I made myself
the center of this.
I don’t know why I seem to be
the only person in the poem.
How’s this: I said I was going
to love you forever.
I believed it.
I believed in it.
I didn’t expect the word forever
to seem anachronistic.
What do you mean,
forever?
Who told you
the wedding poem is for you?
Who told you the wedding poem
has to mean anything?
The wedding poem is a poem
about the poetry we dream.
I see you on the stage.
You are on the stage with me.
You found a poem you loved
and someone reads us its vows.
We try to see the future.
We try to see the poems we are
even though we might not know them.
We try to see the future.
I try to see the future.
We try to see a poem about to happen.
This is a poem about the dream.
I try to see a poem about to happen.
This is a poem about to happen.
It has become a poem for you.
It has become a poem for me.
This is a poem about the poem that isn’t
yet.
I struggle to see a poem
about to happen.
I struggle to see the poem about to happen.
(originally published in Academy of the Heart and Mind, Spring 2023)
For David and Anna
Rain is never insurmountable,
and the sun never gets old,
though we plan to, together,
to grow with green things
sprouting at our feet. We
watch new trees become
wise while the landscape
shifts, as it must, and though
Earth spins briskly– almost
beyond what we can fathom–
it has order, being as small
and in love as we are.
We stand on our plot
of land, firm though
flung through time and
space, the universe we
made forever expanding.
(originally published in The Vineyard, Winter 2023)
I don’t know anyone
but the gnats swarming
around me &
the stranger
next to me calls them
wedding bugs
marriage begins with wings
then seeks blood
sucking glimpse of sweat
on skin sugar all the single
guests swat at the air
around them familiar
the way we complain
of heat so beg
for rain to form in
these shrouds of clouds
to cool us down
it’s nice to have something
tangible to wish for
(originally published in Razor Literary Magazine, Spring 2018)