Zayn Leaves One Direction, Teen Girl Twitter Universe Mourns
Everything seems to happen on a Wednesday — now he is gone and I have a thousand names, a handful of universes, a hot flush behind my teeth. Mermaid cheeks, where did he go — now he is gone and I have a thousand names, videos of screaming, thinning whistled T-shirt teeth. Mermaid cheeks, where did he go — cat eyes dying into 4th period. Please get videos of screaming, thinning whistled T-shirt fusion. Vigils send tendrils up his jaw, hammerhead cat eyes dying into 4th period. Please get out of bed come back. 34 tattoos, samurai fusion. Vigils send tendrils up his jaw,...
Read MoreLast Witness to My Childhood
Sister, I wanted a seesaw: both sides taking turns, pushing the other up. But your legs were never strong enough. For years, I felt cheated, like you’d swiped my favorite teddy, hidden it inside your crooked spine. Daddy said, “No, you’re the healthy one, the lucky one. You can ride the swing by yourself. Touch the sky with your toes. She can’t, unless you help her.” Now Daddy’s gone, Momma, too, and we’re both too old to ride seesaws. Sister, I learned to admire you the day I saw you triumph in the shower with only bars for assistance. You taught me to value my solid bounce on...
Read MoreThe grackle as invisible priest
They possess nothing but two noises— one a skeleton clacking upstairs, the other the shriek of wounded stars. What heartless god curses this summer bird with such a hue and cry? They descend like black angels expelled from heaven, and land like an affront, croaking the rudeness of the blinding sun. Who clothed them in this inky cloak then cast them unsponsored through the air? Two clash over some discarded scraps, lock beaks tight on each other’s throats, then tumble through the dust like cowboys. Their thirst must wait for distant storms. Why no bath, no house to succor them? Every...
Read MoreIf Rather Perpendicular
If we imagined the divine as horizontal instead of vertical, would saints have wheels—or skis, in northern reaches? Would worshippers look into the distance with leveled eyes and imagine their loved ones beyond the line of trees, hills, or concrete? And would houses of worship be tunnels whose ends projected their sacred symbol, to the vanishing point where vision failed and faith necessarily took over entirely, in that realm of metaphor perpendicular to ours and our privileging of up and those wings awfully useful to reach...
Read MoreInterior Monologue (Girl with Smart Phone)
Though it’s no mace, but cell phone in my hand, I’d like to favor you. But I’ve a slew of messages whose import countermand desires of my awestruck retinue who pass me with petitions on the street. Because of this, I claim the royal right to read my e-mail following a tweet to devotees while you keep me in sight. Indeed, not only are my hands not free, but texting makes it difficult to turn, acknowledging those holding doors for me. Thus, I can’t give the gratitude you yearn for who suppose a royal highness grants indulgence to her abject...
Read MoreIn Velvet
(The Blessings of George Costanza) Draped in velvet, the petite wallflower emerges fresh, from a diner, ready for a summer of love: the true self blooms with all to gain and nothing to lose. Now is the time to indulge in a decade of urges. Disable the angst, just like flicking a switch to will hush the chorus of doubt within: acting as a binary shadow-self is to see your life become all it was meant to be. This is no lie if you believe it, spin your stories as truths stronger than antlers where your velvet hangs. Loosen your mind of its vice-grip, untether yourself from the edge of...
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