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On the Third Day

/ Katrina Kaye

Katrina Kaye

I let myself bleed and
smeared derangements
over upturned lips,
but you loved me anyway.

Hard,

with a fist and a curse word,
taking no tenderness with this tear,
paying no attention to fresh stitches.

You murked in my puddles
as if you were used to the rain.

As if it was nothing new to wipe
fresh red from blue vein.

You didn’t let me sleep.

You were up before dawn
trying me on like a new shirt,
seeing how I stretched around you.

Thin skin over muscle and bone.

How pretty this human suit looks
when it is crumbled on the floor,
never given a moment to bend
into my own shape,
easier to just twist around you in the dark.

On the third day
you left me for dead,
dragged my body to your favorite roadside diner
propped me up in a shallow booth,
adjusted my arms and face
as though they still beat blood
paid for runny eggs and burnt toast.
Your treat;
your turn.

These sleeves were just long enough
to cover the bruises on my wrists,
this hair just straight enough
to hide the bags under my eyes.

You took a moment to smooth my lipstick,
with a tender thumb.

“On the Third Day” is previously published in The Fall of a Sparrow (2014) by Swimming with Elephants Publications and The Legendary Issue 39.

Bird

/ Katrina Kaye

Katrina Kaye

I would love
to catch you
for a moment,

like an
inconsequential lie,
a fallen bird
I can teach again to fly,

and when you are
basking in your own sun,
send me a postcard
of the life you’ve won.

With scrawled note
telling me
you don’t need me anymore.

With scrawled signature
saying
Thank you.

“Bird” is previously published in To Anyone Who Has Ever Loved a Writer (2014).

Hemingway’s Curse

/ Katrina Kaye

Katrina Kaye

My mind creeps over you with the thin legs
of a moth. You are unmarked, intent on
your stare, the same seriousness all men
believe they have, but you…
You pull it off.

This is the night you cried on me;
do you remember?

You sob silent from the chair in your
living room, ask if you are doomed,
fated to stiff drink and solitude.
Ask if one day, you will hold barrel to
temple, as your father did and his
before. Ancestral curse shrouds shoulders.

I offer no answers
and you have run out of words.
As I rise to leave, you clutch my arm,
say, “don’t go.” And I stay.
Your eyes have a way of making me
stay.

This is not a novel; not a news reel in
black and white; not a story a thousand
times told. It is between you and me.
It’s a memory;
do you remember?

We are not lovers, only oddly shaped
friends, forever awkward with each other,
but there is something about that night,
the questions confided, the grip on my
arm, the tear running unabashedly down cheek,
that made me realize I am necessary.

“Hemingway’s Curse” is previously published in Catching Calliope Vol 4, 2014.