COMMODITY

This is bad for me
To be so close to this

Turning down $300
To turn egg shells with tongue

We suffer so much for our art

My sisters all have vaginal infections
Who knew we could be so dumb
The ones who hold lavender
In between shoulder blades

Everyone was crying this week

I am a wilted dove

An orchid in bulb

A failed market strategy

My skin won’t respond
To Juvederm injection

I’ve lived my whole life on the brim
Of commercial deceit
The way we liked holidays
Whole families gathered with
Pumpkins the dead
of public space
I wanted to build grand teal chapels when
All I was offered were bereavement clauses

What can we learn from our peers
Monica says

All Drake does is suffer
Sings about women
Having fun
Without him

ON GRIEF

It is daylight savings in LA again
and porn won't load
on phone or in the heavy cheat of
Spring I see a boy

leave the theater when two men kiss

My fashion icon teaches me to sniff
directly up my nose
tiny beads, she says and in the
orange head-rush I find
a conceit for cream
for erotica

plush

this melancholia of a queer life unlived

In monterosso, I didn’t expect
so many pastels
A woman weeps
over a marble statue
in her mint cotton joggers

Now I'm the one to go when
I see my own self in another

Laura Marie Marciano is the author of Mall Brat (CCM, 2016). Find out more here: www.lauramariemarciano.com