Two Poems, by d.S. randoL
a brief correlation between queer sex and U.S. manifest destiny
240116 - 1741
by d.S. randoL
She unrolls me on the sheet
in the dim light of the hallway, a bed
sheet prone to pulling and without six legs,
a little lonely. Drips of protest stain the sides of
the mattress, as in
I claw for more, more.
We draw no lines, a soft square instead — we find it
a better shape to puncture. We hope
the neighbors hear; or at least,
I do. News articles and
video aid ad campaigns
blur the windows, and my mouth rains out
a song — a preamble to apocalypse. Magma in
her brain, she takes all of my fauna. How they
resist; it's all exercise, it's all practice.
The crown of my skull slings a crack on the wall,
I take the urge to shove the nightstand clean
and I shove it back down into my throat and into my fingers,
lest I feel selfish. I grab her and tell her that I'll never get tired.
That the grin I wear pokes holes in everything it gleans
from — that I am a vortex, I am liquid, I am the weight
over an ark of gold, glimmering.
soft writing / music sharing
240514 — 2127 — for m.c. and otoboke beaver
I receive concert footage from a friend via text message.
It opens, after buffering, to a punk show. The women on-stage
are coordinated and bloody. To electric ribbon, blue, riveted and wet with spit,
my body responds — I feel rustling hints of memory, flitting the cabin's corners —
Five states southwest and orange peel sunny — where two pitbulls wrestle
in a chain-link for the silver keys, a bigger lawn. A fencepost clicks open,
then clacks. Shut, my fists pulling close to my chest — my body
will find touch through any scrap of melody, any rubber peelings.
This is the jolt of the drumbeat, reminding me of the soreness
that sometimes I forget to wrap out of bed on time.
It is hard to realize that people notice my grimace, that I pour
discount sugar-cream into a feedback sequence, livid
with nothing but myself. Like an animal with no outward sense,
sniffing the conch with no shell; a hum of reverberation that has
to orbit the sun in order to cock back into itself. Sometimes I feel
like a gun. I'm glad that punks prefer their hands when
they hit me; the bruising colors in more naturally. I'm glad
my friend sends me music. She smiles when we talk about it.
I lean up from the mattress. Something about a chorus,
solo efforts coming together — I know she gets sad too.
d.S. randoL (she/her) is a transfeminine slam-dancer living in NFK, VA. She is published or forthcoming in Passages North, Ghost City Review, Door is a Jar, and more. You can find her full publications and eerie music EP, entitled "Guitar Knots", at www.linktr.ee/dSrandoL.