JESSICA TOLBERT

Prayer

burnt palms dust of the earth
breasts like egg yolk like
cored apples sheath
of palm bundles

of myrtle and willow green
potted olive and myrrh
sky of iron sheets
chime and ash
tining hymns

we do not bask 
in the queerness
of alexander we do not
bask in the illness of god

who dealt in metaphor
filth of filth
of light on stone
her funeral rites

long and spattered with red wax
hildegard schisms
behind a partial stone barrier
clutching the latin texts
a watched body

Thermochromism

it was on the radio then yes
which station you were tuned to
incidentals of your upbringing
early years as juggalo in the exurbs found
the later alt years to be strange
moving slowly in your monk coat
chant generics to quiet swollen
nervous system anti-convulsants
for self flagellants off label efficacy
no childhood memory can be
communal perennials lilacs
pinestraw the dads of the jesuit
school cruise inwood in their minivans

the water must be of sufficient
temperature here to indicate
spectral colors evoked by touch
pop talks about getting high off
mimeograph paper pop talks
about the army years crack
and heroin trash can turkey
this vision of antibiotics clearing
the blood of evils at grandmas
funeral the microphone picked
strains of a racing announcer
off goes suzy blue said the mic
and the dead Russian woman
in the casket didn’t move an inch

Jessica Tolbert’s work has previously appeared in PANK, Devil’s Lake, GlitterMOB, The Collagist, and elsewhere. These poems are taken from her first chapbook, Strangers, Objects, which is forthcoming in late 2018 from dancing girl press. She is from Alabama and also Texas, but currently lives in Brooklyn where she goes on aimless walks and studies to become a social worker.