Responsible for

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Wearing your beanie while I’m typing up my manuscript
Glasses are foggy
Streets are wet
I wish I could slip away on a big black jet
A spider trapped within its own complex net

I’m learning to sew with the ladies from the home
They school me on the importance of finding a good man
They think I don’t understand
That a wife needs a home that she doesn’t have to be held responsible for
I nod and say, of course

I go out early to watch the sun rise in shades of peaches and apricots
Trace my fingertips on deep green leaves
Brush my hair once an hour to stay looking neat
Lana Del Rey on repeat
Most days I forget to eat

When you took me on your motorcycle
You knew I wasn’t afraid
So you zigzagged between cars
Like we were going to reach the stars
I told you heaven isn’t very far

I keep my composure in public
Keep my mind in all respects blank
But that was done for
When I saw a little child, lost in a drugstore
Ten times over

I said, take my hand

April rain

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I’m memorizing
The numbers to call
For emergencies

You, you’re there for me
Like a ship set for sail
I’m calm but I’m feeling pale
On the cusp of letting you go
Pausing
Trembling
So I have to let you know

With you
It feels like the April rain has washed me
Absolved me
A bathtub with rose petals
3, 4, 35
Put my photographs on your hard drive
We’re living past forty-five

Walk along the dock
You speak to me in paragraphs
We share our love and exchange laughs
Holding your hand is scary
Don’t know when the next time will be
There’s no guarantee
No security

Arm wrapped around me, in the living room we dance
I stare at the fire and fall deeply into the romance
A flight delay
Sweetheart, won’t you stay

I need a portrait to make this permanent
Don’t you dare look away
If I start to feel vulnerable
Know you made me this way

And that’s okay

The Chicago Bears

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I go back and forth between wanting your company
Looking for someone who won’t smother me
But perhaps I’m wrong to think I know how I feel
It’s just lately this life has felt madly unreal
In cold cereal and an empty mailbox, there’s no appeal
But if you’re looking for a low-mileage used car I can get you a real good deal
I spend my days choosing my favorites from the hex code color wheel
It keeps me busy while I heal

I used to steer into the next lane on purpose
Just to see if the driver was aware enough to notice
I do what I want and there’s a fault to that
November’s best purchase was a Chicago Bear’s hat
How much I adored those days when we had no thermostat
I had a faux fur coat and felt like an aristocrat
Always asking my loving boyfriend what he was staring at
And I lost it, just like that

Life has felt madly unreal
Aware enough to notice
If you don’t want to know

Then you’re like a lot of people

Semi-automatic (dorsal fins)

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Pastel colors soothe me
Boys, they think they can use me
I’m wearing the dainty lace
You dropped at the end of my bed
Won’t you take a look at me instead?

Your golden glow is irrational
My love for this country is national
I can always taste liquor on your tongue
I hope you don’t think you’re still alive and young
The roaring twenties have just begun
Touch me like I’m warmer than the sun
Do you trust me to hold on to your semi-automatic handgun

I have a habit of making boys cry
I’ve no idea, I don’t even try
Your living room is smothered in country beige
I’ve come in from the back-house with soft, grey sage
My little author, I see you’ve only written half a page
It’s alright to be shy when you’re at this stage

Bears and beers, so the license plate says
I’m a pretty girl so I’m the server in this place
We go out at night, spot tails and dorsal fins
Ride until I feel my eyes caving in

A lost canyon when I once knew
That I don’t want my little boy to grow up just like you
So I did what all of the other mariners do,

I drowned you.

Fifty dollar bills & Angel sharks

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You look much better than when you speak
Grandma says that Grandpa was her favorite antique
I like a boy who uses high speed drills and fixes trains that squeak
Marmalade, champagne, cool as ice on mint
My long, sparkly dress, camera captures the glint
Everyone’s staring at us, we might have to sprint
I’ve got to catch the parade this year
He sips fine, oh man, oh dear
A cherry on top for our sins
I’m leaving room for the might-have-beens
I like to look inside my crimson-red limbs

It takes me for a spin
Hi Daddy!
We’re at the park
It’s getting dark soon but I want to ride this train all night long
Even until the folks with no homes climb on and make room for the night
If this is their bedroom, I’m thinking something in the system’s not right
Squeeze your father good night

The winds and machines, they tell me their tricks
No trace of him left except for his chewed up toothpicks
They line my stairwell like a lunar eclipse
Several times at the docks we gazed at the ships

Now I’m on my own and I buy lemonade mix
I’m sour like the lemons you squeeze into your eyes
Yes I can tell when it’s me your patronize
A thousand types of metal, a thousand heavy sighs
When I close my eyes to sleep I see swarms of magpies
Come towards me in the dark
Nobody’s ever come so close
Fifty dollar bills and angel sharks
Your love is what I miss the most

Your love was better than most
Your love somehow got disposed
Your love haunts me like a ghost
Barely escaping
I’m
I’m barely escaping