After the Poetry Reading
by Michelle King
I.
We wove through the pines and our patches of pavement,
Till we found each other and 2 PM,
Arms loaded with ripened letters.
Then drops of grey slid down our shoulders. We clambered into the house.
Verses seeped through our pores and dripped to the floor.
We sat together to stack our lines like pancakes,
Running over with poetry, so generous and saccharine.
We couldn’t digest them properly,
And we feasted for a time and time again called us away.
II.
I trace my footsteps back. The pavement shimmers
With dripping honey.
It floats on the atmosphere, glistening
On my fingertips.
Twilight pours a carton of gold upon the horizon
And far off in the western sky, she holds out a tangerine.
Let me take it home with me, just this once.
I closed the world behind me.
III.
I’m enveloped by too many walls.
My fingers stick to my pencil with longing;
The ink is yellow. The ink is swirling with yellow
Within.
IV.
I clean up my house from top to middle and rewrite my To Do List
For day after Today. I misplace a few letters,
Arise, pace, scramble for Concentrate, for something sweet and tangible.
I plug in the juicer and line upon line pours through my veins
As the words glimmer orange on my page.
Dust mites, riding on the last lemony rays,
Tumble over the windowsill
And hide behind the pillows where the shadow eats them both.
Michelle King’s home is in the hills of Pennsylvania. She travels the world through literature and a myriad of thoughts.
Photography by Kenneth Godoy