:ne
Is there really something?
go see.

:wo
You can die like a poet
Head in the oven
Metalled bone on the ceramic
Body in the atmosphere-

People can too fly.

:hree
Or like a starlet
Fireflies drowned in gin and good bourbon
Waterlogged, unseasonably hot.

:our
Little dog, blue dog, blue eyed, rather
You followed him, instead.

:ive
Stomp on it. The patterns of the bottom of your shoe
On flesh, dirt, silk stains
Putrid violet, graveled fingernails
Flowers that aren’t flowers anymore.

:ix
Six little legs
lead me to the tree in which you sit
Six million more take you away.

:even
Go like me. Go like mine.

:ight
feathers are locks of hair
Wet and
Unpickled vegetables in the cellar
And your teeth haven’t bitten since you left

:ine
Rubber, leather, rather
Smaller things, quieter than before
Indigestible raw material
Elk skin and grass and tree bark.

:en
Or not on purpose at all
There is destiny in things that fall
And grace in misdirection and error.

:leven
If you really have long toenails
Then why do you need a shovel?

 

***

 

Christine Neacole Kanownik is founding editor/curator of The Electric Pumas, a poetry and digital media series. You can find her work in such places as: The Huffington Post, jubilat, EOAGH, H_NGM_N and The Poetry Project Newsletter. She lives in Brooklyn.

“11 Ways to Make Me Miss You” originally appeared in SHAMPOO.