on trepidation
oh empty oberon bottle / oh sertraline / oh fucking desire to / attend the state fair / buy goat cheese / spend an evening making manhattans for a business man’s pocket change / complain about it / oh painted highway line / patches blooming yellow / oh electricity of wanting to / separate those going down the road / watch netflix without flinching when strangers touch each other & don’t soap their palms afterwards / instead sharing liquor bottles / plaid bedsheets / the warmth of another mouth against their mouth / paper hearts taped to front windows / body of aching water / ribboning against the shoreline / & now that I have told you about longing and touch / everything will be about longing & touching / here / when I say love it will no longer mean love / no / it will mean loose hands / concrete-kissed knees / insufferable brushes with dying & sometimes wanting / an original diagram of drowning / oh $7.99 porch lights colored like / life rings / dog-eared pages that papercut my fingers / star charts I never learned to read / but suddenly want to ink on my spine / my popcorned ceiling / every wooden pole attached to a power line / here / when I say moon it will no longer mean moon / it will mean / a lack of daylight.
When I’m Lonely, I Shop Online For Things I Don’t Need
because I want to be irresponsible & buy a fucking trampoline
turn axiomatic & jump away from earth & back to it, pausing in-between
to marvel at the yellow clouds, a broken yolk of sun melting
the June sunset. Toss in an obnoxiously large yard
flamingo. A box of National Geographics with comet pictures
cut from its pages. I want to splurge like I’m dying because
what if I’m dying. What if the distance between fabric & sky
can be folded inside my throat. What if I breathe
& get distracted by the fluttering, miss the crows
staring down at me from oak branches
as I simulate flight. Dream the decaying
is only temporary. Let this be a reason to cave
& drop thirty dollars on purple hair dye
that nobody will end up seeing. Give
everything away. I jot down lists of butterflies
& national holidays for no one to see. Celebrate
by sipping lukewarm beer. Consider the trampoline
& never take it home. Decide to practice leaving
the earth anyways. Study Ursa Major, but like everything
nowadays, only from a distance. I give in. Fill a basket
with sundresses. Narrow it down to one more
than I actually need. Forget about falling
& cataloguing & ozone & atmosphere. Empty myself while
wishing someone would stop me, but I always untether.
