This villainy has been generously sponsored by a gift from the Wild and Precious Life Reading Series. Learn more about sponsoring our dastardly deeds.
On the Rag
Let me tell you a story
about blood: When I was 13, I wrote to Playtex
to complain. They sent me a life’s supply of whiskey
glasses to hurl into a fireplace.
I may as well have shoved a wasp up my crotch.
I should set some parameters,
forbid myself from thinking
about speeding freight trains. I’m so ravished,
my whole body needs a maxi-pad.
Have I told you?
My mother used to be a psychic, predicted
there was no future for me
as a sacrificial lamb impersonator.
She was right. I wear my womb on my sleeve.
You’re Not Wrong, I Learned to Read Early
The world needs a new name
for immoderate fondness.
What’s a fresh phrase for sex
standing up in a garage during
a rainstorm? I need a bardic finger
to put on it. The word passion comes off
the tongue common as a duck
in the man-made lake of a small
suburban township. I’d rather
a misbehaved giraffe eat the pony-
tail off my head than an innocent
kiss fuck-up my lipstick.
Hand me a hieroglyph for all the drinks
I’ve thrown into my many sweethearts’ faces.
Love, in any language, is a hard word
for a dumb-struck mouth to swallow.
Amy Thatcher is a native Philadelphian. She is completing her first full-length poetry manuscript titled Rick James in the Garden of Eden. Amy’s poems have appeared in: The Journal, The Shore, Cherry Tree, Bear Review, Denver Quarterly, Split Lip, Does It Have Pockets, Palette Poetry and forthcoming in Copper Nickel, Salt Hill, Chestnut Review and other journals. Her favorite revenge story is the tale of Saint Christina of Bolsena, a 3rd century Italian saint. Christina was martyred for refusing to give up her faith and marry a man. For her defiance, she was jailed, her tongue cut out by a guard. Christina collected her tongue from the prison floor and threw it at the guard, putting his eye out!
