ill going about their daily tasks in desperate
faith that the script cycling around their head
is more false than the one they repeat out loud.

I don’t ask why they don’t lean on me the way
I lean on them. I know they let me hunt
down their lost shovels in the woods.

I know picking the worst of two bad options
is how you learn a third. I know I’m just some
character with my own agenda until I’m not.

I follow the rules of the game, knowing
the consequences of running into the
monsters in the cave aren’t half as bad

after “The Meteor of 1860” (1860) by Frederic Edwin Church

Everything that we know comes to this earth
is dead.

The girl with the dirty blonde roots puking in
the small stall has #NoRegrets,

Beauty is in
the eye of the beholder.

They’ll tell you that whatever the object is
doesn’t matter.

But it means.

And you see it,
and you want it,

One too many thoughts
and now you’re tired,

sullen, disappointed
and, sigh, the drama of it all,

the suspense, the waiting
for some adult

Little pieces of you in my veins, like shards.
You say, you got me wrong,
and I say, ah, honey, that’s not you, that’s me,
is it my fault,

Decision letter erasure poem after Burnings Magazine
(original publisher of “Voice” and “sometimes when lydia wants to answer a question, she”

decision letter erasure after Delicate Emissions Poetry Zine & EIC Dusti RW Levy (Ember & Sunset in the May 2025 issue)