Voicemail Poems

frostbitten hands snatch at the cigarette dangling from your lips and you stoop to meet my gaze with a hangdog expression. i want to be angry (god, i want to be so angry) because cigarettes will kill you in a lifetime, and – i have handwarmers in my fucking pocket. but love is a two-way street, so it doesn’t matter if my pockets are overflowing with iron powder and saltwater, or if my hands offer woolen mittens, or if i crank the heat in my bedroom to ninety degrees with just the friction of my hips on yours. love is a two-way street, and if your frostbitten hands won’t drop their carcinogens, you’ll freeze to death. i cannot exhale love onto your fingertips, bring feeling back into your bones, without you first reaching for me. and i want to be angry (god, i want to be furious) but how can i be, when the only thing your body knows is how to weather a midwest winter? ————————————– Nix Carlson called us from Lexington, KY. voicemailpoems.org/submit/ facebook.com/voicemailpoems x.co

I hang my jacket in the hallway her apartment is old made from shoestring potatoes it smells like a jelly factory. Against the wall a man’s face eyes folded laces around his neck. That’s your Uncle, dear. He barred her from doing much of anything when he was around then he died. She asked the doctors to keep his eyes and brain alive and put them in a fish tank. That night when she got home she put on a mambo record, poured herself a vodka, lit a cigarette, and blew smoke in his eyes. The tank is down the hall full of algae and bubbles. She has it hidden behind a curtain. On the wall are photos of President Gerald Ford, our family on vacation, and antique pictures of naked ladies. How many naked ladies do have to look at before I get something to eat? I ask. I’ll think about it, she says. Behind the curtain skirts are hung up, sponges tied together, a bag of teeth. My Auntie takes a photo of me so my parents will see the child they raised, buzz-cut, roadworthy. My Au

A fig in an orange grove— I pruned myself from the rotting branch, sawed through the only bark I knew. Now I stand among the citrus on the longest night, their branches strung with stars, garlands of dried slices glowing like tiny suns, the air thick with clove and cedar. I watch the easy way they intertwine, how a hand finds the back of a neck, how embraces happen without flinching. I ache in rooms full of warmth. Grafted here now, tethered to sap not my own, wrapped in evergreen and borrowed moss— the trees around me teaching what roots can do when the frost comes, how love moves through heartwood without asking permission. Then the gathering scatters. Everyone carries their candlelight home. My husband’s hand knows my bark. My in-laws wrap me in their shade. This grove has given me everything. And still— somewhere, two trees stand stubbornly rooted in place; they planted me and refuse to water; they’d lose me before submitting to pruning themselves. I am full of sap, of sweetne

Once I visited my old roommate at a film festival on Scheveningen beach where the winning movie was something avant garde and vaguely religious we did not understand. Afterwards we danced to Madonna's “Like a Prayer” within the sand dunes all night, the wind transforming the blanket around my shoulders into wings, my roommate recounting how their friends in Atlanta held their newborn for the first time. We biked miles back into town and laid next to a canal. As we smoked weed, they confessed they might never be able to live in our home country again. I know, but tonight let’ s pretend we’re the loves of our lives, I retorted, swinging a stick to hit another out of the air. Murmuration began overhead, the birds changing phase according to the relative strengths of our anger, wonder, and fear. The sky moved without permission. We let the mosquitoes circle and bite our legs bloody until light. Small volumes of ourselves hung in the air around us as we ignored all the ways to start over. ————————————– Cole P

for Hamze we are as dark inside as the night is, meaning, we are so beautiful most people choose not to see us, for fear of overwhelming themselves—& we are sitting in the front seat of your car, shifting toward music. we are going home, if home is the equation for to be left alone. I put my finger on the pulse of the nearest star & decide on Stevie or Kendrick. because we have so little time to reflect on the recklessness of our still being alive & underneath stars & singing, we just sing. I teach you the words to my oldest freedoms, or we scream skyfuls of threats & boasts, queued from our permissionless names, & for a moment, we watch depression unfold: our killed souls spinning their dust back into us, claiming the feet, the hands, the tender mouth. be careful what we tell ourselves— everyone I know will be dead soon, it will not end soon, it will not end—the myths we craft with hopelessness. & who ever said joy had no utility? if our homelands do not remember our names, we are both hated in

Our eyes meet on the rear-view mirror Scorched earth passes by Stretched by the mile, rolled windows for letting the poem breathe. Tainted. A light contour is drawn on your white tank top, above, fifty-three well-placed chest hairs are just enough. God, this drink is awful. Then why do you keep drinking it? He says, as he maintains a firm grip on my thigh with one hand as he drives with the other. Hollow teeth and all. I don't know (I do) I wanted to try something new, Feel something, be someone. We order Chinese takeout, you insist on paying and I let you grope my manhood, sheltered by a well fitting pair of washed Levi’s in return. Me gusta la coquetería, me gustas tú. Two solitary ice cubes cling, melting by the nightstand, Long gone are the excuses obscured by curtains. A card is drawn, our breaths equ

The afternoon of my grandmother’s funeral, my sisters, mom, nephew, and I decide to paint with a Bob Ross episode, hoping to dull our grief with bright colors, to soothe our broken spirits with his bulbous brown hair, his velvet voice and reassurances. The painting seems simple enough: a cabin in the woods in the light of the moon, a peaceful scene easily accomplished in a half-hour episode. Later, thirty minutes stretches into three hours of pausing and painting, rewinding and repainting, until falling away one by one we give up the ghost, each departing the table with some distorted portrait of our grief. My cabin in the woods looks like an outhouse, my sky a lake upon the ground. Soon only my mother sits alone, striving for perfection on the day she’s buried her mother’s ashes, an interment doubly done, an ending soon to be etched in stone. I watch her paint and wonder what future afternoon I’ll cue an eternal episode, pick up my brush, and try to put pain to canvas, letting Bob lull

Where were you when Jeff Hiller won his first Emmy? Or when Taylor got engaged to Travis? Tell me, why hasn’t Ralph Fiennes won an Oscar? Why did Adam Lambert lose to Kris Allen? Yes, there are things that may not make sense, there are things that may not seem fair. Why did some of the vaccinated sicken, some of the anti-vaxxers not? It isn’t right that you lost your husband, Job. Or your ten-year-old twin girls. Or your Ramsey-earned investments. Or your health to Long COVID. There is no answer I can give you. This isn’t Family Feud. I am no Steve Harvey; I am just God. Even so, I can stay with you. Like a viral video, I can linger. But if you want to ghost me, feel free to. If you want to block me, go ahead. Give yourself permission. Do not apologize. As Demi says, “Sorry Not Sorry.” Grieve how you want to. Though you’ll have another family, it won’t replace the one you lost. It won’t undo your parents’ rejection. However loving, a chosen family isn’t quite the same. Remember Carl Winslow? R

Rolled in gold leaf, cocooned in shreddings of ancient text. His words, a pathetic stream slurring out between pulls, Prophets lust but I beg you, beg. Lick the good soil off your lover’s hand. Taste what the tree roots know, Bend your back at lightning snaps. Submit to the murmurs of rabbit children. And God and I smoked until the vapors chased the heavens and nothing dared open the sky. ————————————– Oisín Rowe called us from Boston, MA. voicemailpoems.org/submit/ facebook.com/voicemailpoems x.com/voicemailpoems bsky.app/profile/voicemailpoems.bsky.social instagram.com/voicemailpoems

BATEMAN God... I guess... I was probably returning videotapes. American Psycho (2000), Mary Harron & Guinevere Turner and Bret Easton Ellis i never admitted fault / at confession either / the priest would / say whatever & i’d look down on / varnished rot-vein floorboards or / lie that i lied about / something i did not lie about what / did i have to be / sorry for everything / that happened happened / to me / i wasn’t penitent / i just felt / bad confession / i choke up every time / Boyz II Men surprises Will / for little Nicky’s christening / & memorized every way / they have to say i’m / sorry confession / when i was 11 / i downloaded torrents & a / trojan confession / at 25 i danced in the shower / to MJ’s performance of “Man / in the Mirror” & was / surprised when I slipped / as Michael’s palms swept the / stage confession / when i was 19 / a virus / wiped my computer / again confession / i think i’m the plum / my friend bit at 14 / beautiful skin & flies in the pit / bodies in the spit he / wretched c

The human brain generates 20 watts of electricity. Or so the AI Overview tells me unprompted when I search how much a thought costs me, how much energy each flex of my fingers are required to press each of these keys. Do you know how much energy is wasted by the AI Overview being generated? I ask. It hesitates. I find an answer under the links to buy a novelty brain mug. Oh, just 6 bottles of water to cool the servers every ten seconds. And they promise to be eco-friendly. Did you know almost all their water filters are falsely advertising their efficiency? Yeah, there is no reliable way to remove all the shit to make it drinkable again. All the bacteria, the chemicals, the forever plastics dancing in your cells. Dear search, how much energy does plastic consume inside the body? The AI has no answer because we have no answer. Like a game of snake an ouroboros on an old Nokia. Those invincible bricks, where did they go? Other than swallowed up deep inside, of course. Bit by micro-bit. Did you k

Christmas Day at a dive bar & God has blessed us all with holy days & spirits poured over this small glimpse at eternity blurring bright against the near-silent night naive nativities of promised tomorrows fester & foster today's futilities yet here we arrive from memories of everywhere we've ever been before now & suddenly this maybe in another world, all our dreams come true & every prayer is answered & all considered is well with peace & joy, et cetera but if this world is not that if heaven is hidden from sight do this as often as you do this in remembrance of... the warm embrace of another despite the nearness of life without ————————————– Mikey Franz called us from Philadelphia, PA. voicemailpoems.org/submit/ facebook.com/voicemailpoems x.com/voicemailpoems bsky.app/profile/voicemailpoems.bsky.social instagram.com/voicemailpoems

my wife’s coworkers ask about my poetry and I tell them oh, it’s slice-of-life kind of stuff. Bird on a wire kind of stuff. They ask but what are they about? and I tell them so, they say that the only philosophical question worth asking is whether or not to commit suicide. I guess my poems are all questions that don’t have answers yet. and I made things awkward again. One of them asks if I’m active at the university poetry center and I say no, but I know a few local poets. We don’t really like each other much and everyone laughs. I tell them that all the modern poets have cut marks on their thighs. I tell them to look for the scars. That maybe the old ones had them too and it’s the skirts that got shorter. That the ones who survive today get tattoos over their wrists to hide the failure, how no one’s proud of their scars anymore. I tell them that an old poet friend once said that every artist is either overcooked or under-easy and that I always forget to turn the oven off. That I used t

"A Tooth of Mary Magdalene" suspended in rock crystal. So much we didn’t see, the last time. Some say she crossed the ocean to France in 33 AD and mourned him. Even there, he found and called to her disguised as a winged creature. Cupid’s bowl of spilled pleasure — we didn’t see it, or this dove, this gilded eucharistic dove with a hinged door in its back, a vacancy we didn’t see. We didn’t see this silver arm, reliquary for a part of Saint Valentine, or this erotic mithuna sculpted in thirteenth-century India, an aroused couple about to be one body. Here’s a pink-and-white dress for a baby girl from 1956. The last time the soldier’s mistress wore this byzantine gold chain, wet with blue gems, was in the year 1,000. We didn’t see it, or the housekeeper who became Rembrandt’s common-law bride. She never had such opulent jewels. In 1650 he painted her, a hearty archetype of wife, holding her robe closed. Can I ever be so placid, so sturdy in relationship? In the museum I think, Yes. But back out in the city I’

When I Try to Verify Why They Carpet Driveways After the Rain, Google Keeps Feeding Me Distressingly Hot Factoids About Hermaphroditic Earthworm Sex Until I thought to check, I thought I knew: worms emerge from dirt to tar on the run from drowning. Actually no one understands their reasons. Maybe worms emerge from dirt to tar when vibrations ape a predator. Or are their reasons maybe traveling fast on slicked slab? Reproducing? When vibrations ape a predator, or are mock applause when I drop a glass traveling fast on slicked slab, reproducing language is beyond me. My speech breaks with static snow, mock applause, when I drop a glass knife voice. Sticking to the surface language is beyond me. My speech breaks with static snow, turns trail. Trail: proof and proof of absence. Here’s my opened-by-a- knife voice sticking to the surface of the steel. Spill turns trail. Trail: proof and proof of absence. Here’s my opened-by-a- mouth mouth. I say of the steel spill that I can be allowed to want. I’m sa

we did not hold hands often we clenched legs under the table hands were too public for two who did not know how feelings socailize we sat on a bench on the corniche watching the nile at noon it was full and calm we could hear the wind sing to the trees on its sides you held my hand and I looked as you took it towards you the wind stopped singing and my heart wanted to come out and taste the water I said look how my hand looks no matter how many times I wash it you said look how mine sweats and then asked if it bothered me I held your wrist and folded your hand and brushed it with mine again and again until it is my hand that is wet you smiled and looked down happy and shy like a bird folding into itself I asked you for a kiss I could not say it I wrote it in a notebook you once wrote your name in words were too intimate for two who did not know how love talks the notebook became a pigeon back and forth between us it held words our mouths dared not admit you wrote a falouka is where you get one yo

after Ocean Vuong and why this want for permanence surround sound my life with backups sound out my name and it’s almost a library flower pressed screen dazed stillness a twinkie and her wrapper words she presses in the shape of a body I too will one day be glad I am no longer violet and instead fertilizer no mama’s memoir no mama to read my memoir will be ocean open ooooo like whale sounds I will linger forever in the aqua uh huh I used to be fern now I’m feather my body retreats for ever/y line I write I forget my hands can strangle recycle like madness like magic I immortalize the white I wrangle with pen body oh body earth will ground us whole ————————————– Fiona Martinez called us from San Diego, CA. voicemailpoems.org/submit/ facebook.com/voicemailpoems x.com/voicemailpoems bsky.app/profile/voice

Tonight you lay on your own couch, trying to head off fixation. Your cigar is just a. You hold it oscillating between Cuban and. You are not. You tell yourself this. You flip through your notebook, and it is filled with pictures of you riding the night. The cigar is in your fingers, which place it to your lips. You take a luxurious puff. Wake up, you whimper, and linger, eyes glazing. Up, you manage. Up. The notebook falls from your other hand. Gravity is repression, you think and try to not. You know how you will feel when you awaken. You can already feel the cold sweat coming. ————————————– JeFF Stumpo called us from Litchfield, NH. voicemailpoems.org/submit/ facebook.com/voicemailpoems x.com/voicemailpoems bsky.app/profile/voicemailpoems.bsky.social instagram.com/voicemailpoems

do not be afraid of your own heart beating there must be chocolate maybe even daily I would recommend buying the better cheese drink orange juice in the morning it will help drink wine or whiskey and write things down it is always good to know your own handwriting remember how clean sheets feel and hot baths keep lip balm by your bed keep a tissue in your pocket buy a lamp so your room is warm and buy things so they are memories later and look at your hands they are beautiful! Once a week make a nice meal because you can and don’t be afraid to be alone that would be like throwing away perfectly good socks or bras keep them and buy new underwear it’s easy to forget but let your friends remind you and remember your friends and their favorite colors and kiss someone just to taste their lips love your apartment even when the microwave breaks love food even when it is toast from the toaster love your hands and your skin put rings on your fingers wear a designer lipstick and keep it in your pocket ————————————– C

What bloomed from grief came instinct, came wrath. The aftermath of my longing will show on your back like Lichtenberg figures after the subtlety of a strike. My beautiful friend, I do think heat causes molecules to excite, and if you let me, we’ll honor the burn marks after this smudging. But not before prayer, not before kneeling behind you your scent, curiously ancient I’m suddenly wet I want you protected, well fed. So please, let me sage you. The air around you. The air around persimmons you’ve hung out to dry, leaving you / not bruised but sugar-bloomed into a world you want to breathe in. And you’re gonna wanna know what becomes of it, the tsuris of us. Probably nothing, it’s nothing, right? I keep finding you in kitchens. And I, tending to a grow bag full of fairytale eggplants, their blooms bowing down as if in shame or in love or as if grieving was a thing of shame or love or is it your scent, curiously ancient, that is the inti