Two Poems – Carrie Laski
September 7, 2017
this poem was not about you but then suddenly it was about you
neutral carpet
nothing to hold
kill kill kill
lawn chairs in the living room make me
lose
my flame for everything
but sleeplessness feels fine!
opiatic and thin
I want nothing but dustless surfaces
to trace in the afternoons
when the sun is falling down through the stairwell
did you know?
that the sidewalks in Jakarta will swallow you whole?
like herons ingesting prey
like my excuses for staying in sheets that aren’t mine
like my ineloquent goodbyes on train platforms
that punish me
nightly
I walk from room to room
mouthing three words
again
again
more
I remember you!
shoulders, neck, mouth, thumbs—
scratching strings
how I could love you!
trading flesh
reading about New Argentine Cinema
this might take time
so let’s leave it for the morning—yes—
let it soak
extend the wine
box of mangoes
casts shadows
quite terrible
shade
my eyes and pay the woman I
wonder how I’ll get them home
then
heavy afternoon
hours to kill
windows
open catching sounds
radio from somewhere says the game is tied
reach for me don’t reach for me
bursting dark
screaming flesh
this
is what evening is
oh, say there’ll be rain in the right season