just yesterday
it was suggested
i begin

to make use
of a feelings
wheel

i am a poet 
& i am fifty 
three

out here not
knowin’ shit
from Shinola.

This poem was created by call and response with my boyfriend and I via talk to text. Each line we changed who would add to the poem….enjoy lol 

once upon a time
two kitties were walking into the woods
because  they left something behind
 from the heist, a bit of goods – 
prized pots of tuna fish, a bag of neon mice
and the freshest catnip one could find. 

as they ran past the trees they saw wanted signs
And heard barking in the distance,
But they made a pact no kitty left behind. 

Once they found the bag of treats
They zigzagged Up the trees
To join their feathered owl friend
and help them get away scotch free 

The kitties cheered in celebration
but we’re in dismay, for the feather
friend hoo-ed, shaking the limbs,
the goods, sadly, fell away. 

(And then I was gonna say something like a cat burglar’s life never pays…?)

I’m having the hardest time forgiving 
The people who threw more weight on 
When they saw me drowning

I should have taken more 
photos of the moments when we
both laughed until our bodies ached,
when it was enough to feel
the presence of your body in
the same room. Like a reptile
withering in the sun,
the photographer in my brain has 
apparently forgotten how to do his job–
how futile it is to remember anything
anymore. I went out today and bought
your favorite wine, saw your eyes 
reflecting back from the bottle. 
If I pour another glass, 
will you join me?

Time used to stretch himself out  
and suspend me 
when I jumped
into lakes 
and ponds 
and blue holes
to join my love already splashing,

but now He lets Earth hold me closer,
has found a mossy seat for me beneath the red maple tree
where I can blow bubbles for my grandson to chase 
as they’re lifted
skyward
by a breeze

The crack in the face of the clock allows time to slip through my hands

Suddenly, there I am.

Buried alive in all of the wasted time spent hating myself because I wasn’t enough for you

I scream into pillow cases that still smell of cigarettes and that perfume of yours that I always hated.

But there I am.

Swallowed whole by the memories that you and I built on the furthest thing from a firm foundation.

It’s three AM, and the patterns on the ceiling have started answering all of the questions you never did.

They tell me things I want to hear about you and me, so that I almost forget that I’m all alone.

I don’t want to make it stop.

The pressure builds beneath my skin, only reminding me that you’re gone.

I lie here begging the ghost of you to help me.

Anyone.

Help me.

I swap the sword at my throat for a butterfly pendant.
I shimmer salted vanilla scented. I swish baking soda
dissolved in a cup of cold water but do not taste it.
I paint my nails silver with white glitter, layer polish
until my claws are strong and nearly unbreakable.
My spine rises sharp and untouchable, hackles up,
I grin and it’s harmful. Dowse myself in lavender at night,
restless, arms contorted out of socket like a broken doll’s.
I forget to take photos of my face. I won’t be eighteen forever.
I breathe hot in the sunlight. My mother says my skin
is so smooth as she works out the knots in my back,
but all bone, she says, all bone. I want to be sharper.
I want to be something the mosquitos don’t have a taste for.
Bloodless beauty. Tame mostly, like an aquarium shark 
making little circles in a tank too small, so numb, so cool.
I sit in the living room. My parents tried hard for this baby.
The baby is grown. She is a bit less innocent now.
Let the graduation card fall to the ground, take the money.
I pretend I can’t read the cursive note so I don’t have to.
It’s addressed to the baby, what she would’ve become
in a different timeline. No one knows who they’re writing to
when they mail those prewritten cards. I laugh hollowly.
I’ve been missing for a long time. I want to vanish fully.
I want to walk into the sundown and let my body dissolve,
all flesh and spectacle becomes smoke and fog and air.
I ponder my escape, but I make no movement towards it.
I do the little things I can that give me the illusion I am:
coat my teeth with fluoride, fill the garden with delphinium,
go get labs drawn but lie to the nurse taking my weight.
It’s like going out walking in a dream. I journey for miles, 
but slowly all becomes familiar, I learn with great effort
that I have been tracing the same circles back to the start.
I am placated by the ritual of it, this tight endless spiral.
I barely notice the fake coral, the artificial light rippling
so lovely above me, the glass box so finite, so cramped.

The day was hot
but the breeze was cool
and I felt giddy as a child
swinging
outside the old school house
while cicadas
sang
in the hills.

my mind has been seeing warm potter hands
molding a clay bowl on a wheel

ten years from now, i will be married
to a potter with a scruffy beard
an intimidating nature
and an aura my parents hate

tiredness will chase
my battle between stability
and the creative pursuit
i will be home thirty minutes
past my teenage curfew
full of indignation and spirit

there will be an office job left behind
a type writer collecting dust
stacks of bills unpaid
dried clay stuck on my nailbeds