“My Sweetheart Hates to Shop, But This Is My Fantasy” by Janlori Goldman
“Dress you
as you prefer, in men’s clothes—no rush
or pressure, pleasure in the long look,
the urge for color, then touch—”
“Dress you
as you prefer, in men’s clothes—no rush
or pressure, pleasure in the long look,
the urge for color, then touch—”
“Tonight, I am going to push
the Susquehanna away with my body,
ignore the waning moon’s fractioning
of light.”
“That afternoon, I pretended
to be a cat—tabby, kinked tail.
And the finches behaved
accordingly.”
“Still awake believing our silence might leave us,
desperately needing to make ourselves heard,
every girl told a story before parents came for us.”
“Frida’s Boots beats too with life and determination. In many of Robbins’ poems there is an appreciation for the moment at hand, the pleasure in the everyday experiences, and the heightened awareness that it is all temporary.”
“I imagined us drinking tea
sugared with honesty,
laughing till we turned soft
as fallen apples.”
“Always, I begin
with nothing and too much
to say.”
“Some days
almost everything’s about sex, and maybe
this as well: groan of old boards, joists
and beams remembering, music
of breaking glass.”
The third entry in the Writing Queer Joy Workshop, an online series presented by CALYX Press.
“Then, when the black nightingale returns to the forest,
when the audacious sun is high,
I wonder, beneath the waves,
where a few more wing beats would have taken me”