Let me refer to myself in glorious ways:
Colors seem brighter, the sky is a shocking blue.
I carry my stomach in this bowl
and earth is planted in my blood.
From your last letter, I gather hills.
I’m trying to keep my tenderness in check.
Trying to see what kind of grill the neighbors have
is everything I couldn’t do before.
Now brown eggs shift heavy in my palms, this bowl.
Words make their way up my thigh.
I swear very nice boy and I refer to myself.
No. The hills are holding you and I refer to myself.
Let’s be honest: I need a real man, I say out loud.
Every weakness I have settles into a tree trunk,
stays all winter. I don’t know if I mean it.
Winter has lasted five years already.
This morning I press into the edges of my stomach.
My mother makes coffee in California.
Ladies will say we are expert with machines
but they will be under two pitchers of sangria.
I said you could make music out of this.
Ingesting artificial palm trees, exploding.
Your letters are getting shorter. I am getting close
enough to the sun to touch the tip of its cigar.
We carry what is shocking and heavy in blood.
Music seems brighter: the sky the sky.
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Excerpted from Other People’s Comfort Keeps Me Up At Night by Morgan Parker. Copyright (c) 2015 by Morgan Parker. First published by Switchback Books. Tin House edition (c) 2021.
