"Stippling," "Candy Sex Toy Rally," and "Meat Carcass"

Stippling

The world is too busy ignoring us.

We're like a contorting partially paralyzed ant -
worked its way out of the poison trap,
but can't move any further.

So it stops in its tracks and begins
traction and reaction.

A cop rolls down the block
as the sound of sirens cause
the plants to bend, sway. Underwater,
the jellyfish grow wings. And I

ask the night impossible
questions: will there be light at death? What
is a body without a head?  When will the snake
visit me again in dream's corral of cores?

I've been trying to create a new seahorse,
with a head that can re-grow like starfish.
Star anise shapes the different colored eyes.

You can't call every one
of these shapes and colors inconsequential.
They are my central organs. Why I grow
spoons and different sized spoon-rests.

Come take a nap with me. Our napes
can drape. You can paint me the color
of a siren song monsoon
and we can float away on the back 
of a gay gray
wave
until we are marooned.

Then we can fly
ourselves out of the sticky water,
swooning
and meet the full
moon.

Use our minds to crack it like an egg
dripping dark red
onto the kitchen sink.

This sink that grows in bursts of new life forms.

 


 

Candy Sex Toy Rally

I remember one of the last times I talked on the phone
with his parents.
They said maybe our relationship could have lasted
if I had been a better cook.

And I thought to myself and then said
out loud 
I would have been sane longer
had he had a mechanical cock.

After years of him not caring about my body,
I would fantasize about opening a box
of chocolates and finding an assortment
of sex toys inside.

Which I planned to use as method of care
for the body overlooked.
Did I want someone
there with me while I dove into doves?

I wanted to reverb my birds,
turn their songs into chorals.
I wanted to cry under the covers,
more free than usual.

Every wax doll wing
will have its own name on the wrapper,
hand written by me.

Wall paper figures
will pop off the straight and narrow
to walk wildly. 

To march political rallies in the street
carrying pepper spray bottles
filled with more sweet chocolate doves.

 


 

Meat Carcass

 

1.

Another fish head in another doggy bag.
A little doggy figurine twirling in fingers
as the fog sets in. 

An albino catfish down below.
Some people might view it
as a unique creature that can't see.

Others just see it as seasoning for their meat.

Rare steak or raw
ingredients stuck
in the freezer.

What happens when it thaws?

When it pretends to coerce and
then seeps out...

 

2.

Neverland might be better
than an uncanny task-list,
the run on questions.

Or maybe unexpected
outreach. I need to get gas,
step out of my car with a light
in my heart it is
sunny today.  

"Hey bitch. You just hit my door."

I look. Beautiful face all spruced up even though the look
on it not nearly her own.
I stick my whole 
head in the open window toward her.

"I am sorry.

She retracts, unsure 
of what to do now that I am so 
close to her.

"It's not my car I am just worried
about the man."

Her voice quakes, eyeliner
twerks. He must abuse her,
but I am not sure what to do.

I want to help her, give her something,
but I don't want to just buy her
a gas station hot dog

"That hot dog is stale."

I say it out loud and she cracks
up, hysterically laughing.

 

3.

Then she whispers, "Listen to me!
The reason I sound hysterical is because of him.
He tattooed the word hysterical on my thigh.
He told me that is all that defines me now.
What if he's right?"

He will never be right.

Let's go together, holding hands,
and I will get "hysterical" tattooed on my
leg too. He can't use both of our legs
at the same time. He's not allowed
to treat our bodies like we're baby animals
in a petting zoo.

If he even tries,
it will be four legs against his scrawny two,
and the only choice we'll let him make
is where he wants the word "meat carcass" tattooed.
On the front of his face or on his dick.

 

 

Juliet Cook

Juliet Cook's poetry has appeared in a small multitude of print and online publications. She is the author of numerous poetry chapbooks, most recently including red flames burning out (Grey Book Press, 2023), Contorted Doom Conveyor (Gutter Snob Books, 2023), and Your Mouth is Moving Backwards (Ethel Zine & Micro Press, 2023). She has another new poetry chapbook, REVOLTING, forthcoming from Cul-de-sac of Blood in fall 2024. Her most recent full-length poetry book, Malformed Confetti was published by Crisis Chronicles Press in 2018. You can find out more at https://julietcook.weebly.com/. Juliet recommends Planned Parenthood.

j/j hastain

j/j hastain is a collaborator, writer and maker of things. j/j performs ceremonial gore. Chasing and courting the animate and potentially enlivening decay that exists between seer and singer, j/j hopes to make the god/dess of stone moan and nod deeply through the waxing and waning seasons of the moon.

 

Edited for Unlikely by Jonathan Penton, Editor-in-Chief
Last revised on Wednesday, May 17, 2017 - 21:02