by Tracey Knapp
Nobody here, because this is a pandemic poem.
I didn’t want to write one. I didn’t want to love
someone once, which actually worked
for a while. You never really know what
you’re good at. Brushing my teeth three times
a day is not my forte. Who cares?
Really, are you sitting at home
worried that I might lose a tooth? Probably
not. You’re probably glad I wore a mask
to Target today while buying everything bagels
and cat litter. My days are so boring.
I wouldn’t be surprised if this poem bored you.
I’m just going to keep writing though, hoping
my inner elk fleets to the tree behind some
barn in a much different poem.
In it, I would describe my lover licking
the space between my breasts—wouldn’t that
be hot? But I’d need a lover then, and some
reason to dump him at the end of this poem,
I think I just did. We’re over. So sorry.
Tracey Knapp is a poet living in Berkeley, CA. Knapp’s first full-length collection of poems, Mouth, was published by 42 Miles Press. Her work has appeared in Best New Poets, Poetry Daily, Rattle, Five Points, San Diego Poetry Annual and elsewhere. She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, and has work forthcoming in the anthology Sh!t Men Say to Me: A Poetry Anthology in Response to Toxic Masculinity. Sally Lelong is a visual storyteller working in a variety of media that lend themselves to use in a conceptual framework. She lives and works in New York, and routinely exhibits her work in a variety of settings from print to thematic installations to street art.
Global Poemic 