as i push my glasses up,     my fingers still smell like you           arching up, body bowstring-     taut. behind me, the road           spools out, a necklace of red     tail-lights, and i imagine dancing           my way back to the crook of your     neck, mottled in purple and gold.

S.Y., “archery”

I. i made a mistake. II. find my mind flighty and fighting. see body like rock, eyes erosions to tunnel through to excavate the viscera of what makes me like this, stable to scared in six seconds flat. III. i clamp my lip between teeth like bleeding is learning to be better. if only blood were bitter, a tincture to cure my tendencies.

S.Y., “don’t dwell on // what you fucked up”

jealous bony cagey fingers and ropy muscle have kept me down in bed, waiting for something. the crack of blue and the ray of light through the curtains might be it. day after day of trudging and i still see shadows in everything. but the red leaves and the gamboling pup soon teach me how to breathe again, show me how my cavernous chest can erupt with joy.

S.Y., “evergreen”

she grins hacksaw-feral. ruby teeth, & yr throat is pulp —

S.Y., “on two legs”

peel back my frown lines late summer melt-in-your-mouth bittersweet heart sinking marshmallow airless and hot pocket starburst sticky fist ooze and undulate above all stuck on you

S.Y., "candygram"

so many times have i been berated for innate weakness: pinned-back skin, overexposure, indecent pain. so the pretender spawned scales over flayed flesh, hardened little plates that fell at first feeling. for i am no fish: i fear drowning and so much more. and i am no weakling: i withstand naked nerves— can't live without.

S.Y., “ectopia cordis”

puddle-patter rush and slip into bruised bravado laugh again and again and it is pleasure not boredom tiny variations: i frog-hop i foxtrot i make a new friend easy as new skinned knees my hand tight in yours

S.Y., "far and wee"

refuting porcelain some summers, I smith my skin copper walking ankle-aching, wearing near nothing, slow strolling, plant pulling, hand holding. in a hundred years, lay me down verdigris gorgeous.

S.Y., “oxidation”

you float me. i'm borne up, giddy on the crook of your elbow and other such trifles. what a load of hot air.

S.Y., "balloon girl"

my carpet's covered in picked-up pennies even though i don't believe in luck, do i. (oh, but your buckeye is in my backpack and i still talk to the stars when i see them. (and oh, there has to be more than quantum chance when broken hearts can learn to grow into this new kind of love— quieter and more distant, absent of romance—but love no less.))

S.Y., "cynic, pt. ii"

my heart, voracious battering ram, has a dream: fighting out my chest and into air, declaring redly, I DON'T KNOW WHAT I'M DOING BUT DON'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO. EVERYTHING WILL BE ALL RIGHT.

S.Y., “like a voice”

am i a poem cannibal gorging on my gorgeous self: fistfuls of crumby words

S.Y., “hypocrisis”

Tonight I dream you a longship, light and narrow and Norse. Heeding Longfellow, you pass me in the night. The moon is new. You are invisible to me and I to you, so: I am terrified.

S.Y., “Unmoored”

fingers glide over thighs, trace sugar-plum bruises. remember me loose- limbed under you, brain limpid for once in a very very blue onetime moon.                              why, i'm foolish over you, bristling at distance so few days new. i wish this were pure wanton but i know better. i know this waiting, this whispering. this wanting, too.

S.Y., “philagnia”

1. itching to move scratching at seat 2. more specifically: itching to move towards you 3. i have ants in my pants and other things in my pants too

S.Y., “it’s finals and i just want to bone someone (i.e. you) but instead i have to write these goddamn papers”

your head was on my shoulder and my pulse so strong and quick I worried it would bruise you. we hurt each other so well. I relished the sun and your fingers on my bare back— didn’t so much that your eyes were on him the whole time. what of the aching knees? what of you in my mouth, shower water in my eyes and ears? what of hands in hair, cool thighs on hot cheeks, half a night of tangled sleep— so many yous with different names, so many wonderings that sound the same: do you still want me after that one day?

S.Y., “Mayfly”

it is time. i am running through mucosal fog & i am clawing at my mottled thighs & i am squinting at the glare & my eyes are helpless against the sharpsharpsharp daylight— is it is it is it day? it is for juuust a moment and then no, no more, now it is wet & it is clouds & it is damp washcloth over face & it is damp washcloth over heaving chest & it is FLASH it is last night & it is seventeen years ago & it is poolside in february & my lips are forget-me-not blue they are blue they are blue o, they are blue my mouth is cotton- tail rabbit's foot- long john silver- spoon and my lips are blue.

S.Y., “drowning dream”

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