By: Maura Way
My objet d'art flagellates
himself. I am not amused.
My sous chef brooks no
fools, obviously. My sense
of belonging lags behind
my collections. Even snow
globes could overwhelm me.
<><>
Your cut-outs annoy me because
I am from the land of the cut-offs.
Skin your knee in Pompeii and call
it an accident. Flesh can be seen,
the Latin teacher said. Dripping
hollows fashion. Priapus requires
a written waiver from your parents.
<><>
There's no place like my body. There's
Montauk. I took a stone home. The light
house was open for self-guided tours.
The rain turned into snow. I thought it
would be different, same as when I look
in a mirror. There are ruses all around us.
The redcoats are inside out on the lawns
of Leisurama. My body gets this; it dreams
of Dick Cavett and goat cheese. I'm thinking
about Amistad, of course. I'm thinking about
the man who drove me to Montauk. I wrote
him out of the story, but I'm willing to sit
here and take questions if you will applaud.
I'm waiting for Stan Laurel to write me a letter.
<><>
Tricky baseball fathers will admit that I
am right as rain. I usually notice assholes.
The dull nobility of dicks wears me a new
one. My epic expired on my way to another
tropical ampersand. I will get home eventually.
Originally from Washington, DC, Maura Way lives in North Carolina, by way of Idaho. Her poems have previously appeared in The Burnside Review, Verse, DIAGRAM, Hotel Amerika, and The Chattahoochee Review, among others. ANOTHER BUNGALOW, her debut collection, was released by Press 53 in 2017. She has been a school teacher for over twenty years, most recently at New Garden Friends School.
"Layers of time and language compel and annoy the speaker. Both the body and the land demand to be read as palimpsest, and no one surface remains a safe skin. The stories demand to be told no matter how old, complicated, or absurd. This is a long island."