Two Poems by Jennifer Recchio

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The way you s napped me, leaving air
in my nerve e ndings. I sucked you out
with dead po e try, gave away words giving
you away. Bro k e your nerve endings, seeking.

This is Not a Poem About How My Mother Thinks I’m Fat

i carry my darkness in my pockets and it weighs me down
it weighs me down, oh, it weighs me down
i haul my sunshine in my hair and it weighs me down
it weighs me down, oh, it weighs me down

chin up, girl, shoulders back
it weighs you down, this slump you carry,
oh, it weighs you down

my gravity pulling your gravity, weighing you down
my sunshine weighing you down
my darkness weighing you down

the air thickens farther down
it weighs us down

my feet are helium but my hands are lead
they weigh me down, oh, they weigh me down

i can’t carry me carrying you carrying me
oh, it weighs me down

i can’t carry me carrying me carrying me
oh, it weighs me down
thoughts are thicker farther down
it weighs me down and then it weighs me down

the floor is only the floor while it resists you
it weighs you down, oh it weighs you down
past the center it’s faster to-
it weighs you down, oh, i weighed you down

i found myself in gaslights, in oil
in the used up air in the lungs of bellows
in your lungs, weighing you down, weighing me down

Can’t you see it, weighing you down?

About the author:

I have been published in The Camel Saloon and Defenestration.

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