BY ROBIN GOW
i am grieving the caves of my own body.
pushing a shopping cart of cellphones
towards a blackhole. puncture wound.
digital clock. i take out my phone
whose battery i quickly becoming
a dead beetle. ask the machine
to take me to you. a blue umbilical cord
tethered to the moon. i follow myself
across a cheese clothe sky.
mesh & holes & holy. how to be
the muscle you need. unchanged.
you stood as a house inside a house.
holding my breath to survive
in space. your flowers all dried
& petal blown in the galactic winds.
you are home & not home. you would not
remember me if i pleaded. that is not
how a heart works. cannot be made
to recall a face. the way dirt
spits toads back into the spring
after a long winter. my cell phone dies
& have no way home. i could jump
of course, & land in the wild ocean.
you talk to a mirror until it becomes
a whole separate mouth. i do the same.
how easy it is to find your own factions
if given a box to do so.
spaceships break open. debris
makes a ballet across the stars.
there is no such thing as earth
for me to return to. inside your house
inside your house i knit my own.
sit quietly & hope you won't notice
i have written a future inside
your present. do not mind me.
i am just spilling
every parcel of myself.
Robin Gow (he/they/ze) is an autistic queer and trans poet and YA author from rural Pennsylvania. They are the author of several poetry books, an essay collection, and YA novel in verse, A Million Quiet Revolutions. His poetry has recently been published in POETRY, Southampton Review, and Pleiades.