Author: poetryfest

I.
She was a difficult person, too smart for academia perhaps
and reluctant to self-promote
and angry that she was unsung unlike her acclaimed grad school chums.
As Little Edie said she was a “staunch woman”
and the world—or her particular subfield of art history—
just didn’t like that.
She told me about the numerous friends and infrequent lovers
who had wronged her,
so I knew our friendship had a time stamp on it.
But O how we would kiki and make fun of our straight colleagues
(and how some of them deserved our bitchy ridicule
after all the phobic behavior they smugly presented to us queer folk!).
She was so witty and so lonely too.
Her lovely apartment on East End Avenue was covered in dust.
Sometimes she wanted an audience more than a friend,
other times I was her trusted ally, seeking and giving out advice, providing camaraderie.
And then I never saw her again.
Years later I found out she died from cancer.

II.
We had a stormy, silly romance.
I needed something time-consuming
to avoid focusing on my dissertation
and he certainly gave me drama with his erratic, if ardent, behavior.
He wasn’t working
and I noticed letters from the management company
for back rent piled on the kitchen table—
He lived in a doorman building, and I lived in a tenement.
But I paid my rent. And had money to take us out to dinner at the diner.
He had been a model for Valentino and was trained as a classical singer.
He was funny and loved to laugh.
He loved to call everyone Miss Thing,
including me.
He planned to become a Heldentenor
but he wasn’t quite ready he said to be on stage to sing heroic Wagnerian roles.
So he continued his voice lessons.
One day I noticed his back had mysterious spots on it.
He tested positive for HIV and I tested negative.
I pledged that I would stand by him
no matter what.
But then I never saw him again.
Years later I did a search on the Internet
And saw that he was married
and teaching voice at a college in the state where his mother was from.

III.
My mommy was a regal German-Irish feminist from the Bronx,
A strong swimmer afflicted with polio when young.
She was also a cry-baby like me and when we watched Old Yeller together, we sobbed,
and then laughed at each other.
She cried too when Bewitched was interrupted to announce that MLK was assassinated.
I tried to comfort her but couldn’t. No laughter then.
Later when I thought I was grown up, I started calling her by her first name.
She smiled each time I did this, as if to say,
call me what you want—
I know you are still my baby boy
and no matter what name you use
inside you are calling me Mommy and you always will.
Mommy was your first word and it will be your last.
O Jean. O Mommy. I have so much to tell you. I have a husband and a dog and I’m happy.
Well, most of the time.
I am taking care of your house, and its land, which is mine now, but it is still yours too.
And it turns out, I’m not crazy after all, but the world is.
In her last days she was in hospice care in her rented apartment in Brookline.
Though she was ready to be released from her shrinking body,
she took a turn for the better
and I jumped on the Amtrak train at Back Bay to resume my NYC life, if only for a few days.
But before the train pulled up to the Route 128 stop, my father called sobbing.
And then I never saw her again.

IV.
Sorry, but I refuse to sum up.
Yet I must confess
I have attempted the disappearing act too

October 18, 2024

t’s fucked up
and i mean that in the best way, in a way that you would say holding a neice or nephew for the first time. in a way that you would say skydiving or bungee jumping or storm chasing.

it’s fucked up
and i mean it in the way that i could sleep forever with her in my arms. i mean it in the way that im obsessed with her

it’s fucked up that this is a new kind of happiness. in the way that i’ve experienced new emotions in the past couple months. in the way that i didn’t have to be fucked up to fuck her, in the way that it didn’t feel like fucking

i’m fucked up
in the way that i’m not sure how she’s picked me. in the way that all of my insecurities have become static. in the way that i understand all the bullshit people say in the honeymoon phase. in the way that i’m fundamentally changing.

i’m totally and utterly fucked up. in the way that i’m shedding 21 like a snake. in the way that this girl is changing my life. in the way that i’m becoming. and becoming. and becoming.

Maezy Reign

We are not the same, not exactly,
And yet.
And yet we see one another mirrored
When we lay
Eye to eye.
Tit to tit.
Legs and arms and ribs and hair.
Strip me bare and you will find that once upon a time I was just as you are now.
Let me
For a moment
Take comfort
In the quintessence.
We are not the same, not exactly,
And yet
We have shockingly alike horror stories.
We have been violated in many of the same ways.
We have known the same monsters
All our lives
Though we call them different names.
We are so very nearly the same,
And yet.

I am a mosaic of everyone I have ever loved
Every story I have ever told
Every time I flew like a dove
Every time I held fast against the cold
Every time I just was someone
Every time I was so bold

I am the tiles of forgotten faces
Every smile I gave to the universe
Every time I cried in silent places
Every time I watched my heart disperse
Every time I fought until the sun blazes
Every time I broke my own self worth

I am undefined
Every note leading nowhere
Every time I was carried on by time
Every time I fought to care
Every time I reached for a hidden rhyme
Every time I was just dramatic flair

I am a painting by a thousand different painters
Every hope and fear cascading
Every time I didn’t fit within a container
Every time I felt hope disintegrating
Every time I was the entertainer
Every time I let tears out when it’s raining

I am every chip and every crack on my glass skeleton
Every fall bound for the ground
Every time I was left so sudden
Every time I stuck around
Every time I had a kiss that meant somethin’
Every time I was lost in the stars and never found

I am every word I have ever written
Every revolution and revelation I have ever heard
Every time I was one in a billion
Every time I was a part of the herd
Every time I left a feeling unwritten
Every time I won and death left me undeterred

I am a thousand and I am one but most of all
I am Dax Kvaal

Written by a young person at Echo Glen Children’s Center

My mother was supporting and helpful
with everything and what I did
I love her very much.

My father was gone.

Every noon me and my mom
would hangout
and do activities.

Every night me and my mom
would watch TV.

I was happy and thankful.

I learned about how much my mom
loved me.

The first time we met
I had no idea
That you would be important to me
Making an impact on my life

I had no idea who you were
I never heard about you at first
But the impact you had on me
Was everlasting

Even though we came from two different worlds
You turned out to be someone I’ve ended up looking up too
Someone that I can learn from
Someone that I can rely on

You reminded of someone that I used to know
Giving deja vu vibes
That first meeting we had
Was all too familiar

Overtime as we got to know each other
Turns out we’re similar
Even though you’re way ahead of me in life
Which gave me motivation to do better

I felt like I could tell you anything
And open myself to you
Which was strange at first
But it felt right

However,
We cannot be together
Even if we want too
Again,
We come from two different worlds

Society would frown upon us
If we were seen together
As a couple
As one

Rules had been put in place
For us to not be together
And not only that,
You’re tied to someone else

You feel something for me
But cannot pursue
Due to faith tying you to someone else
While I can only watch
Which hurts me on the inside
But I refused to show

The mutuality is there
The feelings between us
But we cannot be together
As it is forbidden

We walk two different paths
And faith brought us together
But we cannot actually be together
As it is forbidden

So I stay quiet
And life goes on
As you go with your person
But we both know deep down
That we were meant to be
But again,
It is forbidden

BUzz of the fluorescents, hummin’ like bees
with a mortgage,
Socks shuffle down linoleum like jazz in slow
motion-
Midnight’s long fingers tap the window screen,
Time don’t walk here it leans.

Gertrude’s got a halo of curlers and gin,
She’s got lipstick older than orignal sin,
Tells the story ‘Bout Brooklyn again and again,
Says, “Kid, I danced with a ghost once… he
dipped me real mean.”
Time don’t walk here it leans.

The coffee’s burnt, but the stories are steeped,
In scars and medals and husbands who sleep
In places the nurses dont go after dark,
But Earl hums Stardust and flicks his spark-
The smoke curls up like forgotten dreams,
Time don’t walk here it leans.

There’s bingo on Tuesdays and pudding on
trays,
And love letters yellowed from wartime
delays,
There’s dentures that click in a Morse-cpde
praise
While the clock-ticks loud like it’s gnawin’ a
bone.
Time don’t walk here it leans.

One woman whispers to walls that don’t
answer.
A name like a prayer, a curse, or a cancer.
The TV’s a preacher with popcorn for teeth,
Selling salvation beneath a plastic wreath.
Death wears slippers and drinks caffine,
Time don’t walk here it leans.

The janitor’s mop writes poems in reverse,
Each swipe a stanza, each bucket a verse.
He says, “We’re all just ghosts with a checking acount,”
And the light flickers once, like it’s tryna
recount-
How silence hums in old machines…
Time don’t walk here it leans.

Midnight’s the loudest hour you’ll know,
With coughs in rythym and nurses in tow,
And the smell of cologne from a man long
gone,
Still lingers like lyrics to a forgotten song.
The hallways moans in minor keys…
Time don’t walk here it leans.

You want the bridge? It’s cracked but holdin’.
You want the truth? It’s bruised but golden.
You want the beat? It’s limpin’ but clean.
Time don’t walk here it leans.

and at last the vulture, the last chain, succumbs

,becomes a smoke thatched soft and meat
wasting vegetable smelling in the grass.

earlier in its years a’gyre, a bird mapping ends, abounding over and—
eyes—leather poignant smelling eyes—the way stethoscopes learn breath—
the eyes—pink-flowered—black-seeded—scan delicious slippery after-hours.

and attunement
to that scent.
proclivities of sun
safe eggs, babies
pierced in mud,
learned again
at each left behind
just-screaming heat.
dung and spoils
learned again.

earlier still the down child, the learn to fly
a recompense for hollow, learning descent, just finest feathers. a fool. it went both ways.

it all began as
an entirely unremarkable

egg.

After “Mock Orange” by Louis Gluck

It is not the sun, I tell you.
It’s these purple orchids
meditating along the verde pond.

I am in love with them.
Love like its petals
were sprinkled in my tea.
The orchid seeds ring
in my ears– signifying
life into my ovaries.

The sound of the pond,
running like the sound
of tea down my throat,
is the same. Resting
in my intestines–
the satisfied gasp
of a quenched thirst
leaves my lips. I lick
them– washing away
the remnants of turmeric
and ginger.

This is bliss. The herbs,
the florals, and the pool
in which they reside.

Grief is like reaching into the dark
and closing your hand around a sharp stone.
It cuts without warning.
You don’t know how to hold it – only that it hurts.

But over time, your grip changes.
The sharpness remains, but no longer wounds.

It becomes a part of a garden of memories,
still jagged, still real,
yet you now turn it gently in your hands –
a precious stone, treasured with care.