I’m buying kettle chips and wheat beer
with a credit card
there’s nothing wrong with feeling on fire
if it’s embarrassing it’s probably good
Italy
I’ve been neglecting my poetry group
but that’s just the start of it.
Sheila Heti says her depression was a wall
that kept her from seeing the world.
I dreamt my ex had a “face disease”
This vacation is the longest day of my life and
even here the water smells like Arkansas,
the catfish think in Italian
I wonder if Joe Bolton
ever wished he hadn’t said
I love you
as he wondered how it was
we came to live in cities.
I got nervous and ordered
the cow stomach at dinner
Solitude
A sofa bed
The catfish & their Italian thoughts
It’s not fun being by yourself
& it’s not fun being with someone else
that’s not an original thought
which just makes it true
The night we met you kissed me in a closet and I slapped you and told you to ruin my life
all I do is eat and drink and fuck
and think about fucking you
and fucking you is remembering
the version of me that got off
just at the thought that I could
in front of another person
this isn’t romantic
this is some kind of sick
cosmic experiment
to take me away from my work
I’m not a fan
of anything
I don’t care about rope or sand or
winged beasts
my god I could die
and will
if you look at me
while you hang up the curtains
you pulled off the rod
the last time
you looked at me
There’s no such thing as overreacting, it’s called reacting, darling!
a doctor told me my ass
is scientifically weak
and that’s why my hip hurts
oh that’s why my hip hurts
that’s why I’m calling you
to ask if you miss me
which is the best way
to know you don’t.
god I feel modern tonight
god I feel present
I just watched a nine-minute video
where a girl named Nicole
that I’ve never met
tells me how to make a messy bun
with just a clip
you tell me there’s no halves with me
you tell me there’s pearls in my gut
I tell you there’s a play about us
you ask what it’s really about.
my friend cuts my hair
my friend brings me flowers to put
in a vase my friend made me
this bay window makes me
happy to be sad
James says there’s a difference
between humor and satire
and that it’s technically not a bay window
if it doesn’t extend to the floor
the void
last night I told ian I loved him
and then he made me squirt
four times just like
in the movies
I’m on a plane to london
to meet aaron at a fuck hotel
I don’t feel bad
about sending scotty
the nudes I take
pills to feel
less like a protagonist
drink orange wine to
feel more like one
I live in new york so I know
about joan didion
she says the void is like a snake
you can’t kill
so you better keep your eye on it
but when you bite my neck
it feels so
good
poem I wrote after I downloaded The Sims at age 28 during quarantine
In Paris we couldn’t figure out how to get
to the Arc de Triomphe so we went to Sephora
we had pink wine by the water
and you told me you didn’t think
anyone ever died from getting fingered too hard
that night I got McDonald’s
and watched 13 Reasons Why alone
on my laptop in Paris
I never told anyone that
a few weeks ago I broke a glass in my apartment and
I was too lazy to clean it up so
I kind of just pushed it into a corner
and now every few days I step on a tiny piece of glass
it doesn’t hurt it’s just part of my new lifestyle
can you die from being in a bad mood?
poem I wrote after I had a dream Jessica Simpson took me “under her wing”
I cut my boyfriend’s hair on Instagram Live
and all I got was a sense of community
and this rush of adrenaline
Spotify tells me I can work from home with Vivaldi
what’s it called when you dread the end
of something before it starts?
we’re out of toilet paper and I just ordered
a bejeweled headband online
it’s coming Friday is it sexy
how much I hate being alone?
I ask my boyfriend if he wants to marry me
we’ve been drinking a new milk made from peas
I tell him I would say no if he asked
he says that’s okay it’s a big decision
I miss the food from Starbucks
I miss the shuttle at LAX
I miss crying in Italy outside
listening to Norman Fucking Rockwell on repeat
counting down the hours
till you’d pick me up at Gatwick
not as a surprise, because I asked you to
which upset you
because you were going to,
whether or not I asked
poem I wrote after I listened to my Spotify top songs of 2019 and it undid all the work I did in therapy last year
doctors really broke the mold
when they invented antidepressants
that make you feel worse
a pill that makes it harder to cum?
honey, where do I sign?!
I tried unlearning jealousy in 2015
I tried barre class
next year I’m going to buy something
and feel better for 12 minutes
poem I wrote after my lover quoted Zoolander towards me
If you don’t have crippling anxiety you aren’t modern
you’re a pioneer woman
churning butter in your bonnet,
having 12 kids near a wagon et al.
sometimes I feel so sharp but my body is so soft
is there an app for that?
I miss the simple things:
emailing someone named Jen,
crying about different types of love on the plane,
saying “my career is my boyfriend” over and over again
until bl
ood comes out of all my holes,
figure skating.
I just want to go to an institution
where they charge you $12
to add the meat chicken
and tell you I once had a therapist tell me
you can’t gain weight
if you don’t put food in your mouth
poem I wrote after I opened a canned wine upon receiving your email
we go for a jog and I ask if you think we’re dead
like a stoner
I don’t like weed
because it makes me think I don’t have legs
but I keep trying it every two years
before a massive panic attack
my favorite diet is not eating sugar
but liquor doesn’t count
I’m going to do sober January
which means I don’t drink
for the first four days of January and then I forget
I love the idea of playing chess
I love the egg bites at Starbucks
I had a dream I fucked Eminem “reverse cowgirl” style
on a beach in another country
If I die I want to be surrounded by everyone I love
and as I breathe my last breath
I’ll ask everyone if my hair looks better
half up
or full down
poem I wrote after I asked my friend if her new boyfriend cares about me
I’m wearing jeans to punish myself unfortunately
I just walked into the other room
to make you pause your video game
so I could tell you that I think
if I read more I’ll be in a better mood
today we filmed ourselves having sex and then got upset
because I thought I looked too big
and you thought you looked too small
then we went to watch the sunset
which is a nice thing to do
my big plan is to lose weight
by only eating cucumbers
cucumbers for meals only
my therapist says it’s so important right now
to be gentle
lately it’s so fucking impossible to talk to her
which is the thing
I am paying to do
the river is low enough that I can go walk around it
and skip rocks
which is a nice thing to do
even as I finish this poem
I’m mad at myself for not having started
another one yet
poem I wrote after another exquisite morning on my phone
why is a bagel with butter so good? it should go viral
dieting is about eating as many eggs as you can
until you cry because you miss life before all the eggs
I love eating but I love drinking too please
don’t put me in a box
should I intermittently fast or intuitively eat
or just continue to think about
food when I’m eating and
when I’m not eating for the rest
of my years
on earth
I’m beginning to suspect
I’m not going to drop the 12 lbs
I’ve been trying to lose
for the past fourteen years but who knows
one time in college my boyfriend
said he needed time to ruminate
and I was like what does that mean
and he explained it to me in the dining hall
now I get to have sex with you whenever I want
and when I’m out of town
I watch porn on my phone
and they say women can’t have it all????????grow up
poem I wrote after I asked you if cereal can expire
there’s a pandemic and I think my arms are fat
I used to worry I had vaginismus
but it turns out I just wasn’t attracted to my ex
I put the wrong kind of gas
in the car and hate being alone
everything I do is on my computer,
which already feels like a word from the past
my children will type before they can walk
when I say children I feel like a painting,
like a Victorian woman
sent to be by the sea with her ailments,
which isn’t not what’s happening
upstate we have near constant sex and eat string cheese
I tell my therapist the rules
of Love Island and we unearth
that I feel like an islander trapped in the villa
wondering how things will be different
back on the outside
there is no world now but I still feel like
there must be some fabulous party
going on somewhere
everyone wearing shawls without me
smoking cigarettes with those long things
what are those? I miss feeling alive
by which I mean crying about my perfect life
and boys who don’t know how to dress themselves,
who tell me they wish my bathroom
was farther from my bed
so they could look at my ass
for longer when I walk away
I keep asking you if you think we are dead up here
the sky is brilliant and the playground is empty
parts of your house are warmer than others
and we sleep in the cold spots, holding each other close
poem I wrote after the new taylor swift album came out thank god
I haven’t seen the sun in four days
and my dad just said he was proud of me
for finishing the leftovers
mailing letters is a great way
to feel like you’re from before
when no one could google you & see
that you did a capella in college
one time I wanted so bad
to fall in love that I did it
what’s it called when you have a sixth sense
that your ex is engaged?
poem I wrote after I had the strangest urge to confide in dear friends beneath starlight
I just took a pregnancy test to feel alive
and all I got was piss on my hands
I don’t think I’d take my daughter
to get her nails done
if I were a mother
she can do that with her friends
if she wants
I’d like to have kids at 35
so I can start wearing graceful linen sacks
and calling everyone “darling”
I’d like to wear lipstick
and lean on a built-in bookcase
and tell you I like Helen Frankenthalther
and did you know that’s her painting
on the Renata Adler novel I told you to read
the one I never finished
because I needed to have sex
with someone who lived on
the Upper West Side
can you grab some ice?
I like ice in my wine
poem I wrote after I texted my therapist that I’m not pregnant
all this hair grows out of the mole on my face
and I’ve got an ulcer from being alive
I’m so smart and beautiful
and terrible and ho
rny
someone who called me a cunt online
just liked my tweet about feminism
but if I think about you laughing at six flags
I still feel so in love with the whole world
and that day we waited so long
to sit in the front car
that by the time it was our turn
it was night and dark and raining
but we still got on the ride
poem I wrote after I tried to write a tweet about sparkling water
I’ve got a disease where I haven’t watched
an entire feature film since the aughts
do you like how I said “aughts”?
you don’t see that every day!
I’ve never been to a sex party
but one time I made fun of this girl
for bringing deviled eggs to an event
and then I ate six of them.
humiliation, satisfaction,
a long walk home in spring.
I love sex and I love before it—
the double vodka soda leg touch
Is it possible to miss everything at once?
poem I wrote after I took a photo of my tits with a self-timer alone like an adult
I don’t want to turn 29
but it’s better than the alternative
I’m tall for my age
and love buying diet coke
years ago I dated this guy in a blue sweater
who was horny to get down on one knee
but I needed to fuck someone
in the bathroom of a divebar in Bushwick
that I later referred to as “finger ass guy”
I’m very interested in Victorian literature
and why my left breast is so much
bigger than my right
whenever someone has a vase
or something in their home
I’m always like where did you get that?
did you wake up one morning
and walk to the open air market?
did the cerulean catch your eye?
did you pay in cash?
errands are so glamorous
before I’ve done them
I’m so in love with the grocery store
with asking you to grab the balsamic vinegar
with watching you eat
the stem of the strawberry
like a party trick and we’re
God I Feel Modern Tonight Page 3