Your compulsive tendencies 

ordering and fitting each item in the bag like 

Tetris, 

one of the few things you are the puppeteer of

Like two peas in a pod

or a two-person assembly line

we work together

Sometimes we forget to bring our own

bags, and I see the stress rise in your bones

I tell you it’s fine, we’ll remember them

next time

a routine so mundane it becomes tedious 

a constant in our lives

a weekly ritual 

Until the day your independence 

screeches to a stop 

we are still a pair, albeit a fissured pair

You order the groceries online and

I begrudgingly go to the store and gather

the eight double-bagged plastic bags

a routine so mundane it becomes tedious

a constant in our lives

still a weekly ritual 

until the day you dissipate

 

A Ford model and a voracious writer

A cancer patient with a bald head that 

marveled

I am Obsessed with her

I want to be her carbon copy

In baldness I see a striking semblance

the tip of her nose

the contours of her collar bone

Her smile and her boisterous laugh and 

the BRCA2 gene she gifted 

Someday I may have a mastectomy and a

hysterectomy to match. Twins.

 

 

I wait for you to come back

 like in a dream made of 

a face that doesn’t 

quite make sense

you’re on the other side,

through molasses

 

 

Giddy with grief 

I wait for it to pass

My vision gets smaller and my appetite 

Bigger

my body expands to accommodate 

the company I stuff down my gullet

it doesn’t disperse 

I push it down further

churning and digesting

Ready to rise up my throat and strike 

again

I’m defeated in a vortex that 

won’t spit me out

 

 

put on those faded leather boots 

you’ll be dancing four hours at least 

assert your body, devious child 

don’t think too hard 

remember when you 

twirled in circles and 

crawled under tables

hear the music pulsing? 

I know you do

people gaze like sheep 

be a gazelle and leap

a breath into viscid air 

dance until you’re worn and sick 

of moving 

 

  

fill me, I beg

to my carnal, primal urges

daringly insipid 

disgusting in their prime porous holes

sealed like wet concrete 

bubbling and burrowing deeper inside

help! I changed my mind, but

the concrete molds and forms

encasing my desperate plea

 

 

unseemly scents lure me on the street;

Bleecker Street pizza with 

the freshest mushrooms 

with garbage bags tossed and

piled on the street 

and trees smiling sweetly 

the wind taps me on the shoulder

and seventh ave winks at me; 

its precious street carved with 

the hustle and bustle of a Tuesday

 

   

They were her diamond studs and she never took 

them off 

I admired them across the room and up close 

when I curled in the crook of her arm

Sometimes they looked like a cloudy sky. They 

weren’t shiny, dazzling diamonds. They were 

ordinary studs. 

Diminished in the hospital bed, her open 

mouth sagging and her glassy eyes pointed 

upwards, I see them. 

I want to take them for myself. I am a 

graveyard thief, stealing from a vulnerable 

corpse. Instead, I take a selfie with a bloated 

body

The cremators save the studs

a stud in each lobe, I never take them off

  

 

It’s like the goldilocks chair, 

but it never quite fits 

It’s only comfortable for a few minutes

I want a chair that I can sit in for hours, 

but this one isn’t it  

I feel obligated to provide comfort and warmth 

I force myself to sit, 

and the chair defies gravity

I’m being pulled down towards the floor, 

but I’m stuck on the wall 

the room shifts around me 

my eyes are blurry, and

I see burning lights 

the walls are sliding down around me 

I don’t know how to get down

 

Making pancakes together is a supple dream

flipping buckwheat pancakes 

in a test of perfections

They’re bubbling; mumbling like they have a 

secret 

Quick, she says, guiding me while I wobble 

with the long spatula 

Barely tall enough to use the stove 

I flip them shakily, dipping my foot in the pond

Rippling into a sloppy curve

a deformed pancake is all I see 

We put bananas and walnuts in next 

pushing them in like buttons 

I watch the edges get crispy and brown 

That’s how you know they’re done 

 

 

I see a paradise in the distance

Is it clouds, or a city? 

maybe that’s what heaven looks like 

It’s hard to tell from this small window

with streams of light pouring in

I can almost smell the fresh air, 

but the window is locked, and 

the view shifts from here 

I want it to be my city 

Cleaner

not quieter though, never quiet 

the clouds are golden-gray and puffy, 

proving clouds are never gone for good

I imagine reading a book in the clouds 

like I’m swinging in a hammock 

Oh! now it turns to the beach

an immaculate beach that I can practically step onto 

the sand seems so close

I see a hammock strung up between two palm trees 

I wonder where this is, but I suppose it doesn’t matter

I smell the salty, briny air and hear seagulls dipping through the air

the bright, sunny light changes to a dark, overcast day

a storm is coming

  

 

I don’t understand what your problem is. 

You sure you want that? 

Do you think it’ll satisfy your 

sweet tooth?

I think you have rotten teeth

 

bodies, 

this body,

blood, 

dirt, 

molasses, 

Pepsi, 

flowers, glass bottles and flutes, 

pink paint and journals, 

white fabric cut downtown 

 

 

the scent of her skin, her belly laugh,

her ferocity, her candor, her fragility, 

her paintings and collages and poems

her green and yellow eyes and wild hair

these things I miss so much it makes 

my throat tight and my teeth clench 

it’s not fair, I scream into the abyss -

it crawls into my pores and shields my eyes, 

pulling me under, 

back in the arms of my disease 

into a soft and seductive hole all by myself

 

 

We

love to

torture ourselves. 

We

are more

masochistic

than we give credit.

It doesn’t take choking

or a paddle to

the ass

or being tied up

to lose feeling. 

The

stories we

tell

do plenty.

Dripped in

honey;

it’s

sweet and it

sticks.

  

 

a maverick among other things, 

I fall in love with a city shrouded 

by skyscrapers and tiny ants 

high up, the raindrops are fat,

falling heavily on my skin 

I get wet looking down

and see through rusted cracks

a maverick, among other things

 

 

He makes me want to 

dance on glass and 

grind my teeth on 

Hershey kisses. 

Is this love?

 

 

a 14-year-old girl creeps out of her room around midnight 

the hallway is deserted 

her hair is parted into French braids. she tucks her earbuds in, 

clenches her iPod Nano, and starts moving 

she glances around, feeling self-conscious but determined

she puts on her favorite song and turns up the volume

she punches the air in time to the music

she practically leaps down the hall, jumping into her own world of joy 

she’s in shorts and a mismatched tank top

it’s July in Barcelona; the humid heat drums on her skin

she wavers, catching a glimpse of color and movement

a 16-year-old boy she has a crush on, and his friends, 

come around the corner 

they stumble, standing awkwardly, and 

watch a girl dance in circles and sing off-pitch 

to a song they can’t hear

the boy unveils a shy smile

she catches his smile, heart pounding

one of them nudges the boy and they 

retreat toward their room. music still playing,

she picks up the pace,

and disappears down the hall

 

 

I have this memory that feels more like a dream:

I writhe on the floor to one of my dad’s old vinyl 

records

Maybe it’s The Rolling Stones or Cream, 

I can’t recall. The sun dotes starbursts and stripes of 

light on my skin 

Mom and Grandma sit at the kitchen table, letting 

their tea steep

Out of the corner of my eye, I see them talking and 

watching me from a distance. They think I’m in my 

own world, unaware

I hear Mom say how much I seem to love dancing 

In my mind, I shrug, and keep twisting my eight-

year-old body on the carpet

I move to the music; an avalanche tumbling down

 

 

I’m drowning but I stay afloat 

like a buoy bobbing in the sea, 

I drift

The water rises but I seize the tide

like bubbles escaping a Vintage seltzer, 

I pop 

 

 

Sturdy and resilient, 

with those green veins 

snaking through, 

I admire their freckled elegance

Snappy and tender

they are the hands that reassure me

and squeeze me and point to my

messy room

No longer gripping flutes and cigarettes, 

but paint brushes and inked pens, her 

fingers flail over tight edges and crisp paper

Her olive-skinned hands crackle in delight

while oolong tea steams and steeps 

It echoes in my ears; the Colorado river 

spilling through the canyon

 

  

I walk in and stand in the studio 

with bright sunny light filing in 

 

an old iMac sits in the corner 

and plays “fade into you” on 

loop. I don’t need to tell you 

who sings it

 

a breeze floats into the empty 

room

except for me 

 

the room feels full 

 

The waves crash like a dog too excited 

to see me, a bull too desperate to 

slow down, lunging for my chest, 

begging for attention 

Sometimes it’s strong, racing towards 

me like a hurricane

Other times it gives up before 

reaching my toes, and gently 

recedes back to its master, the moon

When it engulfs me, I’m held. A rough 

cloud made of silk, clutching my hand 

 

 

I’m happy nervous excited and thrilled

to be in

the luxurious business of 

euphoria 

and 

destruction  

it’s the year of the binge 

and my stomach is empty like a 

liquor cabinet

 

I’m not desperate, 

I just want a companion, a 

friend if you will, to make time

go faster. I need sunlight

like anyone else, but please 

don’t drown me. 

I like sitting on 

the edge

where I can be taken care of

 

 

Time is a frustrating matter

it doesn’t tell us anything

save for the White Rabbit 

that savior of time to remind

us how to keep moving and 

smother the timepiece

tick tock… tick tock… tick tock…

clasping it tightly until 

we’re stroking nothing but the air 

  

 

She takes her time seeing things, unfurling scenes 

through green and orange rings. sometimes closer to 

blue and yellow like a sunflower twisted in the sky; 

like mine

She casts her hands at the sky, saying “aren’t those pink 

clouds beautiful?” 

with urgency 

I open my mouth to speak 

She slows, unhurried by time, 

like molasses spilling its secrets

while I trip to stay on her toes,

tracing this dance in my mind 

Her sharp eyes pierce through like 

the sun breaking clouds.

some might call them beady until she bursts out 

laughing,

a laugh that hollers from deep in her belly and splits 

into a wide smile

She tries hard to fool. But I know her. I know what is underneath.