Doomed for Your Approval
I’ve had plenty of dreams about losing my shoes at the party
I watch my friends leave without me
Do you remember the first romance you ever noticed
Do you remember finding orchids pressed into your book
Don’t ever pull the emergency cord it’s actually an unblossomed wisteria
It’s a good idea to make a list of every worry you have in a day
Everyone has a cause for concern
My hair tie is tight and my hand might fall off
There might not be enough hot water for me
I don’t even know what kind of doubter I am
My history is refracted
My friend Grace is worried that Brooklyn will go on forever
The car horn is my alarm clock, I have to go
Does your problem always have to be my problem
My calendar of grief is wide open
I am comfortable or I can at least exhale on the generally banal fringes
A corpse is always honest, cold as stone
Online Dating
Would you love me if I was a beautiful respectful sugar daddy
feel free to ask more and yes I’m serious
would you love me if I was a weird cutie with a fat ass
If I was a country gal living in the city
If I was aggressively late and lowkey trying to find a summer job
If I was not here for a long time just for a good time
If I was not New York LA MIAMI
If I offered to carry the groceries
If I was a spontaneous free spirit with old school values
If I told you I was only looking for someone to be the horse’s rear end in my Halloween costume
I’m looking for someone to bring home to Hawaii
Looking for someone with air conditioning
Looking for a Manhattan based litigation attorney
Would you love me if I was only one mile away
If I was 6 miles away
I’m not here to make friends I’m here to win
Dear Computer
Here I am so selfish,
sucking on my teeth, staring at my screen.
I wish you could kill me; I wish you could spit on me
and drain me of my blood.
All the infallible charm, astonishing beauty,
the infinite knowledge of many languages
can’t hide forever the cold and profound loneliness
I feel with you.
I look in the mirror at my skin and my hair
and my skeleton so awake, feel my secret places
lost in the miles of digital asphalt and concrete,
nice and smooth for us to drive on.
Take the progress and smash it with a hammer! Throw it in the trash!
I’ll check in occasionally to tell my friends how I’m spending my money.
Draw a Window for Me
Ask me to bring the rhubarb
Let me write in your journal
Tell me you’ll call me back
Steal my shorts and never give them back
Snore in my ear while I’m trying to sleep
Let me lie here and tell me the truth
I’ll light your cigarette through the phone
Let me be an animal and you be one too
American Loneliness
What’s more of a nature poem – a river of trash in the subway tracks or a fox grazing on late night road kill
Turn the clock forward to trick me into waking up for breakfast or make a mud house with a rusty fork
Flowers look pretty even when they die or how often I think of my life as something growing inside of me
Do you want to talk on the phone in an hour or do you want to lie on my floor and hum
What’s more of a nature poem – rats loafing on the trash-night sidewalk
or a snake hanging from wood slats in the ceiling
Have a nice day and avoid confrontation or come and watch the planes take off with me
Its against the rules and very dangerous to be entertained by gum
and also to write landscape poetry without cigarette filters and car alarms
Get bangs and look like my mommy or keep the change inside my canvas bag hanging in the closet
Is this a nature poem: I call you cheap because you let me buy the groceries
What’s more of a nature poem – falling asleep on the porch or waking up to the credits
The nearest mall is 45 minutes away or I know we haven’t talked lately but I wanted to wish you happy birthday
What about this one: reading the bible or drooling on the cover
Do you wash your feet at the end of the day because they’re dirty or because you love me
On Memorial Day we tried to visit Pops’ grave but we couldn’t find a parking space
I’m coming back in June
Maddie Ticknor is from central New York and currently lives in Brooklyn. Her poetry has been published or is forthcoming in Susie Magazine, Three Gummy Worms, Lewis & Clark Literary Review, and Post Mortem. She works at a literary agency and more of her poetry can be found on instagram @runnyprose.
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