Jillian Blackwell
A Handful of Precipices
If the tea whistles
ghostly pale in my cup
If my face underlit by lamplight and yours
upside down
these diver gulps of tea
I would be playing piano music as loudly as possible
my fourth floor fire escape door open
the cliff of the building
the sun that sets farther down Sansom street
pink flushed against the building across
The plants all killed on the windowsill
but the onion I found in the refrigerator grown up like a tulip
My room arranged by rectangles, with no worthwhile window
my fitted bed sheet curled up at the corners, its tired brown flowers
Cezanne apples spoiling on your table
a round red apple forgotten at the bottom of my bag,
so disappointing at the first bite
My lips at the empty space between your two eyebrows and your nose
cold in April still, my apartment floor cold
I, without a plan
fingernails uneven, useless as a purple cabbage
this colander month, if I hadn’t
slipped through each day
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