maybe I should stay up late & destroy myself/pop my polyester blouse diaphanous & spray ammonia on my computer & then it dies/in summer, I gasp in utter horror at my freckles/mistake them for unspecific bugs/just ignore the data usage warnings/the oils in the shampoo that sluiced me, it all smelt of the fried cider donuts of the mill, a soak in the apple pulp distilled/remember the mushrooms in the quadrangle are not trash/despite the sheen on them like stale bread loaves/& in my phone, there is my demon/my demon with a bloody nose & I can’t rescue him/my demon with ugly rattle-clamor/demon I clean from the data cache/though he won’t be disappeared for long/is it safe to eat a peach with a bruise under/peach with visible cellular damage/I squash a radiant, hot spoon on this horsefly bite/in the sterling, I recognize myself like a magpie with a mirror test/I think I know why you threw me away
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originally appeared in THRUSH
Emily Corwin is an MFA candidate in poetry at Indiana University-Bloomington and the former Poetry Editor for Indiana Review. Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Black Warrior Review, Gigantic Sequins, New South, Yemassee, THRUSH, and elsewhere. She has two chapbooks, My Tall Handsome (Brain Mill Press) and darkling (Platypus Press) which were published in 2016. Her first full-length collection, tenderling is forthcoming in 2018 from Stalking Horse Press. You can follow her online at @exitlessblue.