I dreamed I was never so lonely
Re-treading the years where I have never been
My life saved by a peach sno-cone the color of roses
And sitting on the sidewalk outside the 76 eating fried chicken.
From here I can see where the fire jumped the highway and kept going.
I was so angry I couldn’t remember anything about Asheville. My memory
As thin as glass for what I used to be. I had never once given up
On love before it gave up on me. I’m not the type to cut and run.
Someone tells me men’s jeans have deep pockets and I say
I know, I’m wearing them too. Where do you go when you’re a loser
With bleached hair? The next time we’re in Sandusky, Ohio, you’ll get us
The jacuzzi suite and the next time I wake up in New Jersey, I’ll make sure
You’re never hungry again. When it comes down to it, do you
Mourn the people who will be lost or do you feel anxiety for the art
That will no longer have anyone to look at it? Who will
Read my poems when everyone is dead? I dream again
Of the woman I was. I see her across the room more clearly
Than I have ever seen myself awake and she looks really good
And there was never anything wrong with her but she couldn’t stay.
Where can I stay? The unpruned orchards out by Buffalo, the trees
Twisted as silver hands or squids in a tray, heavy with years
Of fruit. The blackbirds streaming like columns of smoke into the last
Hour of sun. The green glass insulators gleaming on telephone poles, the veal kennels
Backlit on the hills with little steers silhouetted inside them doing
All they will ever do which is sitting down or standing up. Where is there to go?
Do you feel this slow shattering everywhere too? The high horsefeather clouds and all our
Hearts wobble like a few windows left in a burned out house.
GION DAVIS is a trans poet from Española, New Mexico where he grew up on a sheep ranch. His poetry has been featured in Wax Nine Journal, SELFFUCK, Okay Donkey Magazine and others. His debut collection Too Much (2022) received the 2021 Ghost Peach Press Prize selected by Chen Chen. He has received the Best New Poets of 2018 Prize selected by Ocean Vuong. He graduated with his MFA in Poetry from the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 2019 and currently lives in Denver, Colorado. Gion can be found on Instagram @starkstateofmind & on Twitter @gheeontoast.
EDWARD MICHAEL SUPRANOWICZ is the grandson of Irish and Russian/Ukrainian immigrants. He grew up on a small farm in Appalachia. He has a grad background in painting and printmaking. Some of his artwork has recently or will soon appear in Fish Food, Streetlight, Another Chicago Magazine, The Door Is A Jar, The Phoenix and The Harvard Advocate. Edward is also a published poet who has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize multiple times.