By Jasmine Williamson
Editor's note: Due to formatting, this poem is best viewed on a desktop browser.
can I buy you a drink you
drank you ice-
bred thoroughbred stopped
for a bit on
the side of the road where
you told me
tourists take
shits then leave leaving again we do
this
leaving
so
many times
but this time you drove
me to a black
sand beach on your tractor and
is that a country song?
I think
it’s then I imagined how the ocean
sounded when that guy threw that log in
the ocean in
the story
my tour guide told
said
the city is named
after
the smoke
that rises
from the bay but it’s not
really smoke it’s steam
like out of a dryer vent you
do not have one but you said you will hang
my underwear on
the line in the basement and
mine will be next to yours and your neighbors’ and
that feels like it means something but we still end
up like that bell jar
in the museum
labeled “elf phallus”
Jasmine Williamson (she/they) lives in Cincinnati, Ohio with her two children, three cats, two guinea pigs, and a tortoise. She earned her MA in Creative Writing at Northern Kentucky University, where she now works as an admin in the English Department. In her spare time she can be found making art, traveling, or planning to travel. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Literary Mama and Sledgehammer Lit. and Selcouth Station. She can be found on the internet as @mosscollection.