by aq hanna
it’s an over-the-time-zone call
and i’ve been having flashbacks
of hearing you through the shower
pipes; all that rust and mold
fighting over things we can’t undo.
this bedroom of elysian: pitch-bright
and hesitant history. forgive
the choreographies of my mouth;
i’d get my teeth bloody for you. i’m trying
to prove i can reconcile against my body.
we counter exile until the sunset
turns blue. to express something
in language is to reduce its truth
i am told. there’re better stories
on the horizon: the stars like bison running
towards the edge just to make themselves
legible. the stars like dandelion seeds;
everything as real as we make them.
you look up and i lie
in dirty paintbrush flowers. the moon
posing as a dirty sun, our new nights
falling at a careless angle. i don’t want love
like a sailor’s hobby; i want love
rightside up. face down. pick me up
baby, i can’t trace it perfect but i know
a pretty country when i see one.
not fiction, but civil light. not cimmerian,
but astronomical dawn.
aq hanna is an emerging writer and a university student in the meantime. Their works call home in The Aurora Journal, Eunoia Review, Mudroom Magazine, and more. She enjoys surprise packages, basil on pizza, and has always wanted to appear on the show Jeopardy! For more of their work, visit https://linktr.ee/qoetry.
Emerge Literary Journal 