The Pacific begs me to swim away, anything
to keep us from strangling each other
on the boardwalk. The Freakshow
is where our love belongs, a two-headed
oddity feasting on dust and bone
until there is nothing left of us.
You sell watercolors of women's faces
and I write the words nobody wants
to remember. I want you to paint
me. You want me to write about us:
As the sun sets over the ocean
I fade into your torn canvas.
Nobody knows we’re fighting; even seagulls
refuse the scraps of our misery. We become debris,
swirling shreds of paper in the salty wind.
Nathan Elias is the author of A Myriad of Roads that Lead to Here (Scarlet Leaf Publishing House, August 2017). Nathan writes and makes films out of Los Angeles, CA where is currently earning an MFA in Creative Writing from Antioch University. His work has appeared in The Blotter, Red Fez, Eclectica Magazine, Hobart, Literary Orphans, Birdville Magazine, and elsewhere. His film 'The Chest' premiered in Cannes Film Festival 2015.
He made it possible. He was formerly a fabulist.
He was faceless, but he was ugly, graceless
and he made everything disappear.
aligning
as fingers
deftly dance
on checkered
smooth plastic
disco stage
Adam’s countenance: beer cask-heavy
his eyes: glazed shallots
his smile: a split itself
Now take away the need
for moisture and the deteriorating
qualities of autumn. The veins
and stems will release as well.
Take away the release. Take
away the seasons.
When Taylor Swift was at the gym in Japan
she watched the muscled back of a man
moving up and down a heavy machine
made by other heavy machines for men.
of spontaneous human combustion,
of pictures with the Cherry Hill Mall Santa,
of a stapler after getting my wrist stuck to my teacher’s green bulletin board,
and on the tv
a drag queen
sharing her recipe
for sun tea
asks us if we want to
watch her take a break
and we take a break
Honeywell closed their Minnesota plant quietly
and the addition of warning stickers on album covers
would save the children along with D.A.R.E., Nancy
and Tipper directing the conversation, for some reason.
I read, I traveled, I, Lina, thief’s daughter, a discarded toy by the campfire
at night, my planets – burned by sparks,
burned by coincidences, in my eyelashes – stalagmites of ashes.
Because Phil Collins is for fools and old ladies.
Because the ocean’s too wide a body of water
for a commando to cross alone. Because gentlemen
never kiss and tell, and soldiers never share
their kill count. Because you teach the meaning
of words like ‘amorous’ and ‘varnish’ and ‘leave.’