May - Poem 23

May 23

lovesong / M. Anne Avera

so it was raining all over like actual armageddon
like the biblical flood come down from god
to alabama in the winter.

it was the kind of weather we got
when two fronts rubbed their bodies against each other
fat raindrops blotted out the sky and
the water was about knee-deep most places
crushing campus up
smelling all sulfur wet damp.

but
you can’t have your coffee
without cream.

the carton in the dorm fridge was spoiled up
real old and clotted to a cottony slop.
and your eyes were all lamb-bright
next to the thunderheads we could see
through the window.

so how could i not
wade my way out down the road
wearing a raincoat older than me sloshing
all the way to the shop n’ save?
(the coat did nothing ‘cause i was still
soaked when i got back
my breath hot and face glowing
in the lamp light.)

how could i not?
you and i both knew
how i felt about you.

Dead Flowers / Desirae Chacon

Gold in youth
was love’s coloring
hopeful adolescent
hopelessly a lover

Red was love
as an adult

time trashed
flowers in the basket of rubbish
thrown into an abyss

Flowers Grey
is the color of late
bloomed just to fade
grew to dissipate
love turned to hate
and just like that
it was the end of a morning
the end of a song
all along it was approaching
a life cut way to short
of where it belonged
burning tears
streaming
falling
without catching
falling in love
for it to be pulled out from under
a longing turned into spitefulness
a love diluted with pain’s searing touch

Dreaded Dreams / Heather Frankland

Dad always says
when in doubt, take a nap,
thinking that a little sleep
would be all you need
for clarity—
maybe your brain-drain
just needed a charge,
but it doesn’t seem to be working.

Instead, my dreams follow
me into the day,
half-shadowed, half-lit—
they have wide grins
and crooked teeth—
their eyes follow me
tell me to sleep—
let them live more than half-lives.

In the corners, I see them—
in the smears of sunlight,
these dreams—mute—
stare at me. Dare me to remember.
Their words bubble in their mouths.
They mumble; they gurgle—
they whisper-shout.

Weren’t they the ones with the wisdom?
Weren’t they the break I needed?
Instead, I’m trying to pretend
they aren’t here, that I can’t distinguish
their words and pauses,
but I’m so tired;
my heavy eyelids become heavier.
The curtain drawn—
the dreams come out to play
they laugh loudly,
their mouths too wide
for their faces--they try to tell
me something again.
Sell me on some hidden truth,
something that I will
forget to remember.

You Wouldn’t Believe What Some of These Men Will Put in Their Grindr Profiles / John Hanright

There’s this guy – let’s call him Ray –
Who deletes and reinstalls Grindr each day
Because he doesn’t want to tell
His girlfriend that he’s, well…

Dominic – Dom, to be brief –
Is so perplexed without relief
He can’t decide whether the weather
Is too hot for him to wear leather

Christian goes by “TSWanted” –
His blank profile is haunted
By the echoes coming from his chat
Did I mention he looks like a rat?

I’m sorry, Brandon, your profile is a little unclear –
See, let’s start with your name here
“Looking hung” – is this a question or a compliment?
It all depends on your intent

Dear “NewVirgin!!” –
As I break into a new bottle of gin
I don’t mean to sound like a dick
But it’s just that, Sammy, this is New Brunswick

“Total Top” Luca has big dreams –
To dominate a twink, he’s bursting at the seams
Except there is just one small hitch
Everyone near him is a switch

The Eye / Jillian Humphrey

The eye that sees you is you.
It becomes you, anyhow. Over and over
it looks, and you see its seeing.
And what it sees, you know you are.
What you know you are, you do.
The eye decides and you say yes.
You can’t say no
until you get in someone else’s gaze.

If there is an eye that never notices
the moon, run and hide.
And if an eye is a net or a hook, run and hide.
If an eye sees you as a child, you can stay
if you’d like. But if there is an eye
that makes things small, run.

When you are ten,
an Indian boy will stare at you
across the lunch table in the school cafeteria.
Take the apple he gives you.
With his fork he’s pierced
the freckled red skin:
I heart U
At recess the other boys will pin you to the ground
so he can kiss you.
He won’t do it.
He’ll step back.
The blue sky will open to you.
Stay in that gaze.

SHOULDER / Shane Moran

Surly happy orphans understand, love (doubt) eventually reorganizes
How we see ourselves. It surely did me, after she cheated at the beach.
Oceans have a way of reminding women how much they undergo.
Unusual, how crashing made my girl think of her moist gâteau,
Lying on a cake pan, waiting to be eaten as I shook my left sandal.
Don’t think that I no longer believe in love—I’m mainly jaded.
Empathize with me, ladies, perhaps take me home, feel bad for me.
Really, I’m a good nightcap, and I’m even better the morning after.

Afterbirth / Christina Vagenius

A mother carries pieces of her children
inside her cells, they say. Like lost grocery
carts, bent wheels wobbling beside the
curb. No name boxes, labeled grief taste
like fork tongued fury release. A fire
between thighs, hatched inside a swell
of water breaking the eyes. I can’t find
the right turn of the tap to turn it off. Skin
stretched leftovers I’d give anything to eat
again. I’ll breathe for you. Even when I know
better. The rummage sale tagged yours, what’s
mine takes time to know. Take my ears, for now.
I can hear the hurt in you. The reverb under
ribs, shakes the heart. It’s true. Did you know
how much a cart could hold? Rolling sideways,
I see you smiling. Something growing, beneath
what has expired. Didn't you say you could make
it yourself? Two parts ear lobe, one part thumb.
The smell of neck and toes and the wheel has lost
its tiny screw. The curb, a canyon we’ll descend
together. An echo calling back to one another,
as the healing stews. I’m getting better. Getting better. Getting better.

Quetiapine 2 / Sonya Wohletz

By nightfall she is lacing
her hair into the skirt of the moon.
With her eyelashes she paints
the manuscript of her life across its private skin.

But without violence the moon
insists on feeling nothing. The moon
involutes behind the other cousins of oxygen
that are marked holy by machines.

She, who by day, flooded
the ocean with cupfulls of milk,
caught belief in her throat like a cherry pit—thin faith
juicing down her chin, her bodice. Her bare feet
falling to the ground like rose petals at the cemetery.
Inconspicuous in a car that no one recognizes as hers.
Flinging the crumbs of her life out the window.

And the fat crow would have watched. The whole
galaxy would have crushed
under the thin blade of his glance.

She still thinks she is waiting for him;
she still thinks the moon wants her testimony.
If not the moon, then surely the flies.

Yet for now, the house fills with sleep, its musk
of accidents. Ants die in the words
she stamps to the ceiling with her acid tongue.
She turns the night like a pebble in her palms—
waxes another crater in a four-cornered fable

with exhausted grace.

She could decide, for instance, that desire was never lacking.
She could osmose through the palest wall.

Afterwards,
the neighbors could lay purchase to her dreams
and argue against the angle and direction of the talus.
She could pink beneath the dry
starlight of autumn and fruit monsters that even
the faintest fathers would have recognized.

Kirsten Miles