Emerald City
I am afraid that Conan O’Brien
wouldn’t like me even a little
and I would like him so much
I would plunge from the roof
like a sick pigeon
and tear away all of my life.
Is that a thing?
—Or its familiar radiance
what we actually want
when we tell our bodies
to attempt worship?
This week, my kitten started shredding
toilet paper rolls. I find them strewn
at dawn, with the carpet’s
half-assed elegance
from that one angle:
<br /> how it feels like same air,
different wind
when it’s really the other way
around. or with sunsets.
what you want
doesn’t want you.
it wants you
to watch it
recede further
<hr / >
dysplasia
every member of T.Rex dies in a different, bizarre accident
& I remember so well the night I called Evan about my cervix
drunk walking barefoot through the road outside the Meadow Lane house
I did not understand the pathology totally the meaning of it
tiny, immature pieces of the body killing off the rest
tissue splayed not infanticide instead, doing the opposite
Though For the most part I see pathos in landscape’s endurance
its noble, or disgracing suffering
& as the body attacks itself when I am scared I act small, even awful
In total there were 2 car crashes, 1 heart attack, an incident choking on a cocktail cherry
we spoke about it lying in bed & in the morning I left
his bathroom had a boy-shower and a girl mirror when I remember it
though memory is always easy and wonderful it’s naming that hurts
that takes forever
Lucy Tiven is a poet and essayist living in California. Her first full length collection, pilot light, is forthcoming from Plain Wrap. Her work has appeared in Everyday Genius, HTML Giant, Pop Serial, 40 Likely to Die Before 40 (An Introduction to Alt Lit) and Front Porch. She writes for The Fanzine and xoJane.
