By Justin Jannise
The perfect sequined jacket: peacock green,
it drinks from the outstretched hand.
And whether or not the hand asks first,
I grant it dear permission, passing through the Castro
towards a barstool to sink into
to do what I know must be done to thirst.
Justin Jannise is the author of How to Be Better by Being Worse (BOA Editions 2021), which won the A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize. His poems have appeared in Best New Poets, Best of the Net, Copper Nickel, Yale Review, New Ohio Review, and elsewhere. Recently a recipient of the Inprint Verlaine Prize in Poetry and a former Editor-in-Chief of Gulf Coast, Justin is pursuing his Ph.D. in Creative Writing (Poetry) at the University of Houston.