After Elderflower Pancakes
We take a bath
with handfuls of sage
I take your empty wine glass and tap
the side of it on the surface of the water
That sound!
I don’t want it to end
I’m too attracted to the impossible
So I will stay here with you
Hello
last line of poetry!
We can see you
coming up among the sage
stuck to the shower curtain
Time
3.
Sex scene in an art installation
We (he and I) admired the furniture
It was all neon and lovely!
1.
I threw salt
(kosher salt)
over my right shoulder
2.
I say I like symmetry
and asymmetry
He nods
Unimportant Poem About Flowers
terrible headache and antibiotics
Matthew Rohrer texts
stay home, don’t push yourself
take care of yourself
I’m not good at taking
care of myself though
I’m learning how to
ask the purple tulip
on the corner of New York
Avenue and Park Place how
she takes care of herself
while so many people
think she is not
important
Emily Wallis Hughes grew up in Agua Caliente, California. Her first book of poems, Sugar Factory, containing a series of paintings by Sarah Riggs in conversation with Emily's poems, was published by Spuyten Duyvil in 2019. Her poems have been published in the Berkeley Poetry Review, Cordella, Elderly, Gigantic Magazine, Painted Bride Quarterly, Prelude, ZAUM, and other magazines. She edits Elecment at Fence and teaches creative writing as an adjunct at Rutgers-New Brunswick.