VOICEMAIL POEMS - Summer 2023

the first boy who doesn’t love me back laughs himself across the bridge and tells me to hold my breath.  he holds my elbow as i step up onto his skateboard and i tell him i must look stupid for trying. the park benches are all green and empty. he does not understand because he is not afraid of looking. he tells me all he can see and it is covered in tired, shimmering dust. he grins for anything at all, even falling. 

in fall, he lends me his favorite book. i softly hold the pages instead of dog-earing them. i finish it in one sitting and bring it back to him the next day with my bookmark still inside. he brings out rain-splotched tarot cards and tells me to pick one. he and i fall asleep on my couch in my farmhouse watching Downtown Abbey. he takes me on a hike and i can only remember how sweaty his hands were and that he calls me lucky.

i ask him to go to the winter ball with me and he tells me he has visual snow. i do not know what this means and he smiles because he knows. he wears a tacky gray sweater over his button-up that says he does not know what he is doing here. it has a logo but no letters. i am a guiding shadow next to him.

i slip his fingers underneath the wrists of my black sleeves and tell him to move instead of dance. when the music starts to make him sick and the colored lights start to change too quickly, we leave through the back of the cafeteria. it is a quarter ‘till the sky is all green and empty. i want to kiss him and he smiles because he knows, but i never do.

standing at the edge of the river, wide-mouthed and joyful and alive, i remember the rocks he pulled me across several miles down. i watch him glow and my lips buzz with closed questions in the night. he asks me if i can imagine tv static falling from my eyelashes. i tell him i can often not imagine anything at all.

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Allen Means called us from Boulder, CO.

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"Colorado" by Allen Means

‘cause i need you pt. 4: the roots

soundtrack: eve, the roots

& is this turning 
back time never heard
it resurrect dry wilted 
fresh rain tender stream 
sunlight thaws cold 
can you feel it 
warm brush lips warm
kiss every numb away
you roughed eve out of wonder
dulled splendour
keep saying dull but how else can i say
you said it best 
let me fuck with it
a most tender instrument
shaped through desire legible 
lower lower
i thought i loved someone once
it felt like eve
the roots took out ‘cause i need you
you can’t erase need that easy
though
it runs flow ready like current
steady moving under steady
& that says nothing of what it means
to reminisce study your sound
bring it back moving let’s trace it 
steve spacek made eve
crispy layers already you metabolized
i mean you broke it down & the roots 
made it live instruments
is that ?uest calling out b♭
what restoration repeats this 
prayer like i repeat
listen listen
i thought i loved him once
it felt like eve
but so far i’ve only loved you
& i only keep loving you 
more

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Tina Zafreen Alam called us from Toronto, ON.

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"Cause I Need You Pt 4: The Roots" by Tina Zafreen Alam

Calyx
(after “Housekeeping” by Marilynne Robinson) 

O, make of my teeth. a sieve. 
drink. from this. font of mercy. 
make of my body. a community. 

lips nets. filter all impurity. 
every virus. every bruised silted 
eye. sifted. through. every hurt.

sold. let tears collected. saltcrust. 
make from them. crystalized. calyx. 
tinkering grass. swaying. invisible breeze. 

realized. glazed stalks. bowing. to receive. 
caresses. gentle kiss. on the forehead. 
gentle hand. on the back. gentled. 

fingertips. sepal split. let me reach. up. 
with both fists. & grasp the wind. that 
joy withheld. cast into the sky. for me 

to find. now. to harvest. to harness.
to imbibe. how then. to live. now. 
with such hunger. on the wind. with danger.

fanning out. in every direction. if i could.
lay a table. for four hundred thousand. 
for all of the empty chairs. lost. and we are.

still losing. pushed away. from the table. 
here. i set a place. for every heart. take up all. silver. 
every syringe. gather up. the mercury. every 

fevered thermometer. cobble together. each scalpel. 
open chested. melted into. oneflowingsubstance. 
pressed. then cooled. into utensils. for our feast.

this is one way. we remind our.selves we are. alive. 
we survive. by silver linings. we dine on. & 
even while falling. peeled away. from seats. 

full. too early. it is salt-glinted things. 
that shine us. into understanding. 
we were always. whole. 
 
this is how. i will sing. for you our supper.

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Adrian Dallas Frandle called us from Stratford, CT.

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"Calyx" by Adrian Dallas Frandle

AT THE END OF THE WORLD IS THE WORLD
[After Frank O'Hara's "Having a Coke with You."]

Having fish and chips at lovely’s
Having a leather jacket you’re in a crinkly top
Having a past is not permissible 
That’s why tonight i’m 90s ethan hawke
Having a diet coke explaining the past to my friend 
Our past involves all the same people but in different accounts
Maybe they treated me differently cause i’m ethan hawke:
A composite of white male longing 
You think this hawke stuff is toxic, and say
A culture of individualism leads to paranoia
Worrying about being canceled is an indulgence
We raise our drinks to the angelic choir of haters
Having a coked-up convo I miss that
You can go back you can never return, is that what they say
Snapped from the gates of dysfunctional heaven
At the lesbian bar we will not get a table
From where we stand it looks like straight people in vests
These days I leave early to go write abt what a great time I had
And you are the love of my life and have no spatial awareness
You piss the whole street off
Standing everywhere like a tree without its glasses 
Your top still crinkling
It’s perfection

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Scout Faller called us from San Francisco, CA.

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"At The End Of The World Is The World" by Scout Faller

it’s, I want to say, totalising,     like
grief is a totalising force - 
                                                   that sounds, 
like a sentence, doesn’t it?
                                    Like something 
other people could nod at, 
                   clasp my hand
but i’m not          sure i know
         what totalising is 
even meant to mean, what 
total? like this 
             is the sum total of my experience,
                   or i have become whole, reached
a total, under the 
           -ising’s hand?        i’ve described trees
                                                                                                        totalled by the wind, bent over, flattened,
               ripped out of the earth
                      which held them, and I suppose
                      it is like that. Or maybe it’s not
                                 so metaphorical,        like this is totally
the worst i have ever felt will ever feel like
       in my dreams i total the remnants           she leaves
                            in my subconscious, in therapy too, like the total
                               of all my afters will be less 
than any of my befores,              in Latin we call this a terminus
                              ante quem and a terminus 
                 post quem, a point
        before and after which, like pre and post noon,
everything      defined in relation to 
                                                         everything      else, 
                                                         everything      in deference
                                                                                    to that highest point, the great eyeball
of the day boring through 
                                         any weather; it has the sense
                                                     of decimating, another Latin word, 
                                   which originally possessed
                                the particular force of killing
                               one men in every ten
     in the legion, 
at the hands of their own commanders, 
                                                                drawing the lots, 
                          no acts of God,              though time
                                  and distance have changed
         that too,                slopping over the
                        sense, holding tight
                                          in its core the fact of fear
                                and of bad, it feels bad
stop asking me questions

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Murdo Homewood called us from Edinburgh, Scotland.

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"And How Does That Make You Feel?" by Murdo Homewood

Today a pomegranate broke open on the supermarket floor, & sucked the breath out of my mouth while I coughed up red seeds. I want to be more like the Olde Times Buffet across the street from Publix with the big sign that says “best quality food available,” but you hold me back with a hand in my gut. Imagine if I knew myself so well; to say, yes, of what is available to me in the panhandle of Florida I am doing my best. Which is to say, of course not everything is great, and yes some parts of me are questionable. I could tell you which, but I'd rather not. Some parts of me are good, even in ways you might find surprising. This is a fine way to think of yourself if you are a buffet in Tallahassee, but what if you're human, like me? What if, like me, you hit a pedestrian with your car because you were annoyed at the driver behind you? What if you saw two cardinals in the road, one couldn't fly, and you circled back to help them but got scared? And now I think of the cardinals all the time, the birds themselves, the one flying awkwardly between his companion and the side of the road, but also the symbol of them and me, the color red, a hand in my gut. I read one time that two neutron stars were so bewitched by you that they became one big angry cloud of gold and platinum. All the happy scientists and howling wind can't save me from you. Can’t keep my dog from swallowing a toy squeaker whole & dying.

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Claire Tames Nelson called us from Savannah, GA.

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"For Craving" by Claire Tames Nelson

for SSH

green anemones reach out soft tentacles
clinging onto my finger like the rough tongue of a cat
we talk
about how you think you’d stay there
for him
about Brugel and how his paintings are painted as if an outsider were looking in

and i say i wish I had a tiny periscope to see in the touch pools with
to see what the anemones see
or don’t see
i wonder
if they have eyes
if i disappear from their world

with a soft tug of my finger

detaching from their eager hunger

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Grace Cooper called us from Fort Collins, CO.

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"Touch Pools At The Marine Science Center" by Grace Cooper

in Philadelphia		
		
my mouth open
			stuffed with black soil
			sprouting poppies&poppies		

drifting blood pollen
			radiating priests holy
			spirits possessing hands	

			soaked in rosewater 
floating delicate skeletal 
fingers grinding bodies into		

phantom dust 	floating
phantom limbs of a
phantom history

 		A BREATHLESS RIDDLE:
how do you remember 
what you can’t remember?

i will peel back skin, 
roll back my eyes & show you 
my tongue, ribcage, & thighs
		
i will show you the depth of my ghost
the one that will saturate your breath
			the one whose name you will give 

every petal as it
withers & drifts from the 
			chasm of my mouth

			to yours

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p.e. garcia called us from Philadelphia, PA.

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"This Would Be Easier If I Had Your Body" by p.e. garcia

i possess 

the digital body 

of norman reedus 

and carry the corpse

of my mother 

up mt. olympus 

trying to feel

anything at all

i marvel 

at the apocalypse 

skyscrapers 

gutted 

like apartments 

in east cleveland 

like the horrors

we wage 

against children 

in palestine

the ocean

is endless

if i believed

in motherhood

my mother 

would be 

the ocean 

i watch 

the waves 

wash away

the tears

the blood

concrete

and shattered glass

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Kai White called us from Kent, OH.

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"The Ocean Is My Mother" by Kai White

Make me into your tech girl. Teach me your modern ways, a New Order. I’ve been a poet so long I only know the fog through the trees by your house. Know only how you reach for my hip in your sleep. I wrote the first draft of this poem in zeros and ones for you. I cry at your parties, Tech Boy. I’m sorry. And again, on your deck at midnight in spring. Last night, you found me cross legged on your kitchen floor. I was memorizing the patterns in the wood. Everyone retired for the night after swimming and drinking. Your face now bathed in stove light as you ask what’s wrong, please come back to bed. But my legs are no longer mine. This room, my hands, it’s all made up. I’m seeing double.  We’re a couple of traitors. You and me, the brimming shot glasses. I welcomed violence back like a war hero because it looked a lot like love. And then I saw you across the room and shouldered the guilt of wanting. The doom made a home of me, stared back in mirrors weeping. You pulled me into the bathroom after it was all over. I thought you were going to kiss me but it was just the drugs instead. We turned each other in at the middle where every story starts getting good. A corrupted file kind of love. Ignored the trespasses and called it forgiveness. Called it even. Outlaws bonded in their wrongdoing: if you go this way, I’ll go that way. I offered you a cigarette the summer you were grieving. It was all I had to give. We were on the roof again. You hugged me so tight I was terrified of who might see. I thought we could hardwire the domesticity I wanted. I waited in line with you at Costco. Helped wheel out the new freezer you just bought and realized I never knew you until I saw you in the frozen food aisle with a basket full of frozen shrimp. There you are again in the garage outfitted with a tool chest and a big TV and a place for me to sit and watch you tinker. You never knew me either. My sheet music and piano hands, my books and phone therapy sessions I had in your driveway. You’re just like me, you know that, Tech Boy? My birthday twin, my December baby, we went too hard and never made it out to the other side. I am still conjuring what tomorrow looks like without you. This poem my Hail Mary, a prayer inside of a prayer. I kept trying to leave so you closed the gates. You drunk dialed my number and kissed my hand when I came back. I wanted to be a good tech girl so bad for you, Tech Boy. I turned to these blank pages when you shut me out. I murdered to be there with you. I ran over a creature on my way to your house and kept going.

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Gabrielle Caggiano called us from Baltimore, MD.

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"Tech Boy" by Gabrielle Caggiano

Girl don’t think it
Tardive dyskinesia; tardive dyskinesia
Calendar calendar calendar calendar
Tardive dyskinesia
Synesthesia I think blue I think shades of blue
Girl stop he doesn’t want you
Got onna plane
Got onna plane
Girl stop
Look up at the calendar don’t think calendar
Don’t think it
Maybe the therapist says maybe think maybe
Maybe everything will break and ruin
Maybe it won’t he says
So what if you’re not perfect so what
Everything doesn’t have to be so yes or no
Yes I think that’s true
Say the longest word you can
Say the longest most escape you can’t stop
The most always the most right I think of it
So many shades of blue
Citrus blues
Citrus is a vibe in every sense
A perfect blue sense
The sky collapsing until I’m outside of it
Think how big the universe is
The longest biggest sky until it’s not sky
And it’s not so black and white is it
It’s not so right
What if everything does blow up
It’s blowing up anyway everywhere infinite
And that’s not a bad thing
Dark dark blue
Don’t get so stuck on that

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Dana Jaye Cadman called us from the beachy suburbs outside of New York City.

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"Obsession" by Dana Jaye Cadman

it’s summer & i still try to write a poem about last winter when we broke up he  said  his type was fun, simple love & i cried too much because all i know is to love like a child, fingers sticky with want & fear of being left alone & that made me tired or tiring not the first anyway at least no ghosting no snow this time only so much rain & a molded longing no heat could save even this sentence always stuck in the past tense always lonely be it summer or winter i mean long seasons of losses, long grief & my body a pavement burried under the softness of fallen petals because in every season something must learn to kiss the ground & in the quiet of falling i still try & cry & try again it’s summer

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Tran Tran called us from Vietnam.

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"Nostalgia" by Tran Tran

I tire of treating the world as an
email I wish to delete unopened. 

The newspapers turned into soggy boats,
sailing down gutters slick with oil & blood. 

The software hardening into tyrants,
tyranny softening into a shrug. 

The round trip of light years between money
& its lack, between those with souls & those 

who bury their souls in the gravel pit
of the self. I tire of arguments
 
for the enshrinement of argument,
of this waste of electricity,

lightning without illumination,
corrupted code like sheets of black rain. 

So much to tell versus the energy 
to tell it; the silence of the deep breath. 

I tire, & then I exhale, & draw 
again, not knowing what words will come next.

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Gregory Crosby called us from Brooklyn, NY.

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"Monday Wears Tuesday's Face Like A Mask" by Gregory Crosby

hair on my head turning silver
koi on your shoulder fading paler
half dozen software updates later
The Algorithm brings us together

koi on your shoulder fading paler
your hands reached for mine in the bar
The Algorithm brings us together
I reach to give directions left or right

your hands reached for mine in the bar
now they reach for mine in the backseat 
as I reach to give directions left or right
our fingers knitted together

now they reach for mine in the backseat
the invisible hand of the algorithm guiding
our fingers knitted together
fingers that swiped right twice

koi on your shoulder fading paler
The Algorithm brings us together

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Divya Goruganthu called us from Austin, TX.

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"Kismet Algorithm" by Divya Goruganthu

No dating until you’re thirty 
was the rule my parents erected

like a concrete wall built for destruction.
It was the reason my first boyfriend
had to lead me in darkness through brush
with the canvas of our Converse soaking 
in grass dewed by yesterday’s rain.
Under a tree, I discovered the electricity
of my breasts, how nerve pulsations
can write letters dipped in honeysuckle
from nipple through spine to clit.
Metamorphosis of lips to portals 
opening worlds all goo and lightning.
The Venusian taught me 
how soft hands can bend flesh to fire

and how a boy always finds a way
To leap over a wall.

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Anmol Priya Desai called us from Tucson, AZ.

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"Immigrants" by Anmol Priya Desai

Poetry via voicemail. Missed calls you need to hear.

Open submissions accepted.
Guidelines at http://voicemailpoems.org

"Calyx" by Adrian Dallas Frandle

VOICEMAIL POEMS

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