we tried to tell each other I’m afraid of this desire it gets worse every time I see you hopeful for what I wonder because your tongue in my mouth means we’re progressing towards a goal I heart writing poems to you even though fucking in poems is good sometimes my heart is involved which makes fucking beautiful in the moonlight there is silence the strewn manuscript of you #poetry #love #telepathy #nyucwp #nyu #2017 #poetryfinalist #shortlist #canada #donttalktomeaboutlove

In a private room, a woman works tirelessly, altering damaged clothing. There are pants for a man who wants to hide scars, a vest for a girl who needs to feel safe, a wool cape to swoop over the shoulders of one who carries the weight. I enter the room and notice the woman is held together with safety pins and tiny fibers that have attached to her skin and look like glue. There are small lines that look like stitches that hold her dress to her body. She looks at me and the sc

Pick an hour of the day, either at the beginning or end, and write down that hour on a sheet of paper. This paper should be folded and put into your pocket. Before you do that recall a place on your body where you had a bruise. The kind that changed colors. Write the place on the body on this sheet of paper. Think about a rainbow for at least sixty seconds. Next remember a time that your heart felt blue. Write on the same sheet of paper what or who made you feel this pain. Si

FRAY You find something. You think of yourself as prepared but you never knew exactly what for until now. You realize it when you brush yourself off, wiping hands on knees and saying something like ‘golly.’ You’ve only seen perfectly coiffed and it makes a lasting impression. You caught a glimpse ofrough edges and it fascinates you in a way you’d never anticipated. GARNISH There was a day several years ago when you picked up the phone and began frantically dialing numbers bec

beginning here is a promise to breathe underwater where laughs emit bubbles break the surface; when you clasp hands and touch tongues play repeat after me while doing butt bumpers and come up choking on the funny. I’m thinking Jill and what’s his face and you remember what the rest of the poem said because of everything and nothing in particular but old fashion plates help me offer my version of the end of it. I write letters addressed to various you’s please don’t break thi

From a street nearby, I wrote you letters. For months they were kept in a box near the door, stacked up and waiting. I wish I knew where you were so I could tell you things. We wound up in the underground. I found us huddled near a vending machine, drinking from the same cup of coffee, laughing at a photograph of a fat man wearing a tu-tu on the wall, advertising cellphones. The train approached, shrieking into the hour, wind rushing. In the middle of Pigalle I sat down and c

There is a couch where you sit in the evening. It is covered in blue suede and a hiccup. It looks Victorian and feels safe. Your head aches. You are trying to write things down in a way that matters. She wears white and sits down next to you. You acknowledge her with a scratch on the shoulder and turn away. Her bare feet dangle over one end of the couch. Her pinky toe has a chip in the smooth brown polish and she's bobbing her foot. Tell me a story she says, leaning against y

I subtracted truth to found eyes, blurred, or blurry, a feigned protest. A sum. Skin covered in fever, she says she’ll wear that or ink, if you’re really blue. That’s what mourners do. When it breaks, you’ll see how perfect it looks in the light. Abstraction unfolds. The iris transparent. Dreams well up and eye risk. A way of thinking in our hemispheric planes. Holding trust inside, you can lumber around the eight ball. Fashion me a sight, not past or present. Proclaim nothin

4 ème- She sat on the steps to Agudath Hakehilot in the Marais. I was coming to meet her for lunch and she waved with her black mittens when she saw me round the corner off Rue des Rosiers. It’s unseasonably cold for January and she told me she’s sweating on the inside. We discussed where we should eat and she tapped her toe to the sound of woodwind instruments. There is a parade nearby and we cannot hear each other speaking. I leaned my head against hers so I could arrange t