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Image: Christine Wang
You said solitude is everywhere
and overwhelming
because love’s worn out from repetition.
You remind me of my twin—
poetic and jealous.
I’m wrathful
and words are not my first language,
but it’s a good day on earth
when love insinuates itself into my hunt.
You should see the orchards at dawn
ablaze with blood, soaking the sky in tender gore.
I’d like to sing you an arrowy song of girl-love
until you agree to eat these stag-shaped cakes
and to love them
as I love the saffron-robed willow.
It’s nice to have someone
to watch my dogs while I rest and dream of what I love:
amaranth and asphodel and sudden death by she-bear.
Lynn Schmeidler’s poems have appeared in The Awl, Barrow Street, and The Los Angeles Review, and are forthcoming in Transition: Poems in the Aftermath (Indolent Books) and Nasty Women’s Poetry Anthology (Lost Horse Press). Her chapbooks Curiouser & Curiouser and Wrack Lines can be found at Grayson Books. Her full-length collection, History of Gone is forthcoming from Veliz Books.
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