KISS RED LIPS (OF MAN) 61

If I stay at this little motel, this woodsy resort,
let’s see how it goes with this bartender, his hot
and cold attitude. I’ll find the unclear
communication annoying,
though cunning may be more apt.
I’ll extend my little stay into, perhaps,
a party, and paper the walls
with these wishes: an unclenched hand
at death and a mountain view now.

READ A POEM 6 / PINING ANGER 69 / LOWER YOUR HEAD 36

I thought reconciliation!
But: business proposition.

Still, it was really good to see you,
was different than dreaming about,
was like that momentary infatuation
that spiraled through a phone cord
that stamped envelopes full of flowers
dried and spilling out, a let down
ground down into microfiber carpet,
industrial beige, monotonous chain
of mailboxed blocks. Come back
come back. I charred a yam but the guts
were sweet. It could really be
that easy, friend.

The horizon never moves if your head
is down. Fickle love, this filial cell,
a membrane of salt and sun, then
funerary flowers and cell towers.
No matter how far we row
this call gets dropped.

Author’s note: The above poems are written in collaboration with La Smorfia, a Southern Italian dream interpretation system, used to connect images from one’s dreams to divinatory fortunes (some of which are included in the above poems) as well as to numbers one should play in the lottery. In these poems, the numbers connect instead to words per stanza.

Emily Brandt (she/they) is a poet and interdisciplinary artist, guided by ritual and somatic practices. She is the author of the poetry collection Falsehood, as well as three poetry chapbooks. Her poems appear in anthologies and journals, including Bomb, Fence, Literary Hub, The Recluse and Michigan Quarterly Review’s SomaFlights issue. She's a co-founding editor of No, Dear, curator of the LINEAGE reading series at Wendy’s Subway, and member of the video art collaborative Temp.Files. She’s of Sicilian, Polish & Ukrainian descent, and lives between Brooklyn and Speonk, on land originally stewarded and unceded by the Lenape and Shinnecock.