Back to Issue Twenty-Six.

desire is poured upon your lovely face
aphrodite has honored you exceedingly

BY LOGAN FEBRUARY

 

staring at beautiful men will       get me killed someday

let it be a good    glossy death over the phone I talk my shit

as the moon sinks       into its own velvet his bliss in my ear

like a cherry blossom            in real life I’m gangly and

graceless          Boy Long Legs I am asked to be       insecure

and not know I’m alive        but here’s sustained eye-contact

for you I reopen my petals   at least remember   their tender hue

neglected   the violets will not survive the night  is this

what fear tastes like      this acid metal    legs won’t go

where eyes go    I said carefree and not death wish

the blade gleams that we live so close to   I must obey

here life is short even though          everyone says life is short

today I feel I am holding      onto warm water and falling

(This title is taken from Sappho’s fragment 112, translated by Anne Carson) 

 

 

The dead boy is poured back into his body

BY LOGAN FEBRUARY

 

in this magnificent heat, and for this reason his legs are
a gospel. A ringlet of black hair wound around the air’s crooked
finger.
I’m talking about power, current
events foster flashback: defibrillate.
Embellish the gasp so it becomes a seam in the lung, a place to say
it started, the learning of warmth a second time.
A bird perched on the scarecrow’s shoulder
without hungry intent. So you realize you are alive, now what? You
leave
the sugar out and complain of ants. Tremble, I command. Then I
ask,
why do you tremble? Object in mirror may be uglier than it
appears.
Perhaps sadder.
Perhaps object in mirror is not in mirror at all.
Share your loss, o quiet creature of thirst. I imagine a spark’s
reflection
should also electrify something. You are left with ants, a pilgrimage
of them.
On the pillow case,
in your wine glasses. On your way to class.
In Twitter DMs. In your sleep. Sure, you can cauterize a void, but
you have a gap even in your teeth. You cry into his pillow so he
dreams of you
at night. Sunny rain, lion cub. Delicate inertia. The mortician wakes
up
already drunk on bad wine.
All that is asked: what are you carrying, put it down.

(This title is taken from Safia Elhillo’s “Alternate Ending”.) 

 

Logan February is a happy-ish Nigerian owl who likes pizza & typewriters. He is a poet and a book reviewer at Platypus Press’ Weekend Review. His work has appeared in or is forthcoming from Raleigh Review, Yemassee, Wildness, Glass, Vinyl, and more. He is the author of How to Cook a Ghost (Glass Poetry Press, 2017), Painted Blue with Saltwater (Indolent Books, 2018) & Mannequin in the Nude (PANK Books, 2019). Say hello on Instagram & Twitter @loganfebruary.

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