One Year
anonymous staff writer
Fall
No anchovies today– not enough of me to hold them.
Just enough of you, to humor me and love abandon.
9:13 AM: Where I might have looked to you, there is no one.
Brooklyn holds me.
You paint cloudy waters.
Still, I am always wanting to show you my room.
If I was Frank O’Hara:
Pointlessly, I am always wanting you.
8:49 PM: I am curled in soft sleep, pained by soft skin.
I wonder if I can become him.
Silently, my mind wanders back to water.
1:37 PM: Tomorrow, I carve into soft butter.
Washing dishes, I get angry, you get angrier.
This Brooklyn hurts.
Will you wake me up tomorrow?
Across from church, we were godly.
Next week, I promise, we die holy.
I question my faith, smoking a cigarette beside you.
Reciting false verse, in torn brown shoes.
4:57 PM: Walking to water, spilling sanctity from my pocket.
Did you remember to turn the lock?
You always seem on the verge of much to say.
Did I tell you I felt sick yesterday?
7:58 PM: We get older around each other.
It's the most hopeless thing I’ve ever heard.
Winter
Mom told me not to drink the wine but I did!
Later I snuck to otherness to bypass my guilt.
It’s like trying to ride a bike, I remember.
But I’ve got nothing, that is not collateral for love.
I am trying to remember
how to love, and how to be firm.
I am trying to remember firmness.
But I’m wanting for the East River, and a few bridges.
I'm wanting for a year ago,
or just a couple days I guess.
But everything is growling up my skeleton.
It’s everywhere,
inside of me,
on top of me,
crawling all over me,
consuming me.
I hate this piece of toast,
and everything is hurting me.
I lick the salt off my top lip, hungry for myself.
I see skin, face, and I see you.
All of it, I want to devour.
The angry and the hurt, I want to devour
Everything in my path and make room for you
To walk through.
I see bodies, I see it all,
I’d like to see you.
Spring
Summer
I chew slowly while I tell you this, my jaw aches. This means that somebody wants to hurt me.
Last June I turned one year older which you forgot.
People forget things all the time and I’ve always understood that and this isn’t what I mean to say, so I’m sorry.
I fell off my bike around the same time– yes, I think this was Last June, outside the city around the same time.
I was doing what I always do around this time: searching for water, really blue water.
And listen– I found some. It just wasn’t what I was looking for.
What I mean to say is that, it was just rain and I lost control and I fell off my bike and I’m sorry. I was in terrible shape, bloody and bruised, which is exactly the sort of thing that makes you so upset, so you gave me antiseptic wipes but I’m too afraid of pain.
It’s cowardice is what you’re thinking, I know.
And I can’t be a Cowboy I know, I’m sorry.
Last June I was eating rocks and my iron was low– is that why you’re so angry with me?
Last June is just this December, a couple months later. I’m gutted.
