Straight – Emma Bolden

tequila tasted flat as a bad lap / I tried
to feel

inside of love a little / like being lit / the way rum
spread

a rumor from lip to hip to if / I had enough / of
lingering

I licked the lie / off my lime waited until I felt /
nothing

like waiting / more like action / more like if I
couldn’t

like I could still fake it / poured another shot
another

glass / sharded in Saturday’s mirror I never looked
/ like

myself & so I said to myself I looked / like longing
must

have found me wanting / another shot at straight
bourbon

rocked / he said I was / so cold all my lips must be
/ blue

curacao from the bottle I slipped /my tongue
across

its rim I studied / the way / he reacted to my
acting

I remained unmoved / I stayed wintered with / out
is

the problem with wanting / to be beautiful is the
problem

with wanting to be / anesthetized as any
optimism  / & yet

breath had such charming rumors / to be is not to
be

every 11:11 / blinked into away / laid merlot so /
where

lies the line / I made into a bed / to sleep on / I
speak my

peace of / living outside / the parenthetical as
political as

an ellipses / a break from the laid / line why
couldn’t I let

myself be