FANZINE

Us

“Sometimes I think about having kids.” I said.
And you said,
“Sometimes I think about getting fish.”

Sometimes I think
you take showers
just to get away from me.

I am too old for this.
How many men have I wanted
more than food,
only to find years later,
that revisiting their memory
feels like sorting through a box
of someone else’s old photos?

Last night I had a dream
I was pregnant
and happy about it.
That’s how I knew I was asleep.

I keep picturing the life
we could have
if either of us wanted it.

 

 

 

Hellraiser

Every relationship
is a horror story,
each one, a house built on
haunted ground.

We all know it’s a mistake
to raise the dead,
but who has that ever stopped?

I brought you back,
an instar, your shell split,
meat exposed,
fluids boiled down
to thick preserves,
your marrow dried to grape nuts
in your bones.

I clothed your wet nerves
in the scraps of men
I hunted for their skin
gave you a heart
built to beat
with someone else’s blood.

There’s too much at stake
to believe that things
can never be the same,
despite your printless fingers
in my mouth,
your lidless eyes
an empty albumen.

————-

_{Sarah Bridgins lives in Brooklyn. Her work has appeared in Buzzfeed, Tin House, Luna Luna, Sink Review, Big Lucks, Thrush, and Two Serious Ladies among other journals.}