Phantasmagoria
I am always being pulled into long, dangerous grasses.
The scene is silvery, circular. Long shadows
of buildings in moonlight. Long are the ditches
and basement windows. I submit to this long-winded
cinema. So black and white it’s blue. Circuitous route, so long
I’m on these stairs again, but briefly. Or is it longer?
If I’m seen, I’ll be forced to long for men
I’ve never met. Their eyes dart like those not long for this world,
drugged and slow. The long wait before strangers meet.
We never touch. Long before the rain comes
I’ve seen this patch of weeds nightlong.
Long-lived drought of dry summer.
Long night of not wanting. No desire
but the body by morning is swollen with longing.
Fromward/Premonition
The ferry left on time. Felt the engine grind in my feet and the seat surged dragging the ocean through its belly to get away from land. My suitcase stood up straight for an hour down below.
Seven passengers. Two were kissing. Her finger held a heavy diamond. His hat covered his eyes. I didn’t tell her how she would end up alone. The sails of passing boats rocked in our wake.
Clouds were distinct from one another. The sun was somewhere. Over the island gloved by a gray hand.
Dream/She is Me
One night, she circled the house
driving tearful, knowing
she would get home faster had she
walked. She cannot be other
than me in the dream. A washed
out character staying diseased
at a motel. A summer girl camping.
The cavities of pumice rooted
out under the back deck
swallow girls in floodwater.
Alarming, it’s the flash flooding–
limbs girled in limbs–
treed as if debris swept
away. Today’s missing
won’t be found. Stay under mud.
Recede with chimes of laughter.
Gone. Chin-ups of spindly-legged
victims. A thousand years of rain
fell in a day. And the next day
forgotten as the town complains
against the whiteness of the new sidewalk.
Gone, brick that slurped snail-slicked
garbage juice. Downed it like water
washes stuck throat bones. Evil fish.
Jessica Purdy holds an MFA from Emerson College. She is the author of STARLAND and Sleep in a Strange House (Nixes Mate, 2017 and 2018), The Adorable Knife (Grey Book Press, 2023), and You’re Never the Same (Seven Kitchens Press, 2023). Her poems and micro-fiction have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Best New Poets, Best of the Net, and Best Micro-Fiction. Her poetry, flash fiction, and reviews appear in About Place, On the Seawall, Radar, The Night Heron Barks, SoFloPoJo, Litro, Heavy Feather Review, and elsewhere. She lives in Exeter, New Hampshire.