Ghosts remove fishhooks from animal bodies
in the desolation outside an empty house.

Somewhere between a fortress & forest
cicadas shed skin & leave exoskeletons

on tree barks.

Every twenty-something in Los Angeles has a comedian friend. In late winter, mine invited me to his show in Culver City with a foolproof pitch: no cover, no drink minimum, nearby parking.

I guess Steve felt if we were "together-together," I'd watch every film he liked, hang on his every word, which I didn't even do for my husband who wasn't passionate about anything.

There’s no room that’s mine. This thought occurred to me plenty as a child, but it was a fact without any emotion attached. I think about it especially when I watch house hunting shows: what a wish list looks like for people who get to choose where they live on purpose.

The first time a boy accidently touches your leg you are fourteen—

i don't know how to manage time
the same way i manage my 
body

away from men
and their hands and their will and their need

to take me when i'm choosing eggs, when i'm walking
to the bus,

I had anted up already: pics in the too-small bikini top he liked, back arched in his favorite Brazilian-cut bottoms. Did you just take these for me? he asked. By your mid-30s, romance is infinite regress. Or infinite repeat. Or just infinite, like Groundhog Day, or samsara. I don’t reuse sexts! I replied. This is romantic. We understand this is romantic. It is, in fact, romantic to take pictures just for him.

The predominant inquisitor of women accused of witchcraft, it is theorized, was a sadist with acousticophilia: a fetishist aroused by the infliction of pain, humiliation and their associated

She crushes up some blow with a MAC compact and does a line, her anger switching off instantly. She resurfaces on a genial plateau of euphoric haze.

As a 10-year-old boy I found ways to explore. Moisturizing with lotion helped. 

One evening when I was fifteen, back in 2009, my ballet teacher arrived at the studio wearing a shit-eating grin. Jeff loved to gossip, and he spoke with a showy Southern twang that made the juice of every secret dribble down our fingers.

I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t want to suffer. I love her. I love her very much. 

When Robert was small, it seemed like he didn’t quite see people. It wasn’t that he disliked people; it was just that he was more interested in igniting, with matches, small patches of grass soaked in gasoline. 

I think about her. A faint yellow light from the street falls on the floor.

I REALLY NEED TO STOP FUCKING MY FRIENDS

but o, what of the familiarity?
of known hands learning anew?
of a bad outfit thrown off like silk?
of the easy joke of it? our names
re-translated? my

The idea that relationships are verses in the song of a life, or that grace notes can be found in ruined loves, struck a chord of latent sentimentality.

When the estate agent arrived I was asleep. I thought about not letting them in. They knocked on the door three times. But I knew that my brother would be pissed if I did not let them in. So I went downstairs and opened the door.

Silos and Lip Gloss

We lie on the floor of your living room.
You push up to your elbow and stretch your legs.

I, on my stomach, breathe deep into hard wood.
Blissed out like teens we are drunk

Avez-vous trouvé tout ce que vous cherchez? the checker asks.

The Years Dad Blamed the Breeze

Some nights I imagine Dad as the lift in a shoe or wing of a plane—
his wisdom packed with imaginary insight:   
all shadows have eyes,he'd say, stoking the embers

I murdered the cat on a Tuesday and by Wednesday morning I was back to work, saying nothing to anyone, scanning milk cartons and zucchinis and rolls of toilet paper.

When I was about five, I prayed to God as I lay in bed. I prayed for the speed of a cheetah, just like the character I had seen in a cartoon on TV. He could run away from anything.

Something bad happened. I sat on the bed. Tammy was under the bed but I didn’t know that. And the mattress is held up by wooden slats but the slats weren’t cut long enough, so they barely hold up the mattress and if you shift your position on the bed, there is a good chance that the slats will move out of place in the frame and the mattress will fall through the frame. And that’s what happened. The bad thing.

“and where’s the melody
to remedy the melody, the remedy to remedy the remedy” 
      -Diane Seuss 

Last ever moments of falling 
asleep with you, last 
ballooning mood & heartbeat 
so I

You find yourself crying on the phone to your manager, telling them you don’t know if you’re in an emotionally abusive relationship or not. That probably deserves certainty.

When she died, she just wasn’t there. I had to ask about her. She wasn’t in the usual place.