Erika Nestor

FUGUE

text messages vanish unanswered
!50!!50!!10!oops fell into the sadness pit again….
!50!you say you’re busy
Salome and St. John
!50!!50!!10!will not stay up
!50!nor the leaf boat from Tennessee
the landlord hears us nailing them
!50!!50!!10!to the wall and leaves a letter
!50!CEASE or pay for damages
you’ll cross it out
!50!!50!!10!write back SEE ME
!50!untouched my eyelashes
fall shriveled in the sink
!50!!50!!10!vivid dream of ex-lover
!50!at the pumpkin patch
sprawled out amid orange bellies smashed
!50!!50!!10!your desk full of empty files
!50!titled evanescence not the band
I turn to your waiting body
!50!!50!!10!arms curled against all manner of cold
!50!my left hip sits in its own slow groan
sore room less a cry
!50!!50!!10!towards awakening
!50!but rather a spin
into the dark garden where you chug
!50!!50!!10!water from a jar and my heart spits
!50!like hot oil strikes the pan
in several sharp gasps

Erika Nestor is from the Midwest. Her work appears and is forthcoming in LEVELER, DIALOGIST, Passages North, and elsewhere. She received her MFA in poetry from the Helen Zell Writers' Program.