Eve Kenneally
SALVO: POST-MEN
Prescribed an interval of time, rounds of shots
in turn. A spirited attack. The refusal to untangle
the rope of a dark dream; a dramatic title, being shocked
into footsteps. Slowly, a new burst of lingering beat: every
woman I'll ever love will liken me to a myth with a tail (no
talons). Yet everywhere, under certain kinds of looking,
I'm always a vague and pliable blend of only thigh
and green jacket, already fearing for the next. Already jumping
into the next blur of lost days spent smoking, staring. And still,
even in the handful of minutes I skirt out swollen
for beer, I shake the leaden stomach drop of a slowing
car. And still, I don't know what
to be ashamed of first.
*inspired by/based on the Merriam-Webster definition
It Took You Four Days to Make the Soup
What's been done in two? Don't answer that. When somebody calls
you brave it means you're stupid and full of heart. Probably
young. Probably you found yourself on the floor of a bar
bathroom past midnight a trip too far into your twenties, waking up
and talking nonsense. Some nights you took the wrong way
out. There are so many ways you do this. You're lucky
you don't mind repeating your stories and goddamn, do you love
the light in here. What do we think this means: when your doctor wanted
to test your heart again, you switched doctors. When anything near you
grows, you claim it.
Mercy
I'm looking to be a cartoon, only my feelings are hurt
all the time. The bells here bite and break. All of my friends
are trying to quit something; apricots in shade, fire weeds, open
doors. If you see one, you go through it. I didn't think to whisper
everything—that I wanted to be there, locked from outside
only. The beginnings of arms & thighs vanishing in dark yards. I miss
so many people, anchor to every new home by knowing what I'll light
in every room. I am aware of my tremors. I am unblocking my shins.
About Eve Kenneally
Eve Kenneally is a writer and alumna of the MFA program at the University of Montana. Her chapbook Something Else Entirely is out with Dancing Girl Press and her micro-chap FOUNDER was recently released by Ghost City Press. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Salt Hill, Whiskey Island, Yemassee, Bop Dead City, and elsewhere. She lives and works in New York, where she spends 30% of her time waiting for the M train. Her website is www.evekenneally.com and her twitter is @eve_kenneally.