WRITING
“Damn she might actually be able to write a little.”
chrysalis child,
one day you will
mourn
how it felt to be
skin-soft
and
breakable
︎
moon
o mother moon
take pity on your crater-carved daughter
for i am lost. and the night is long.
o ancient mother,
was there once a story of a wayward girl
loved with all the fierceness of the prodigal son?
i have searched.
i have searched.
if such a story exists,
maybe it’s from a time before mine.
o hallowed mother,
did you break the body of the woman who bore you?
was it her screams that scattered the stars across the cosmos?
do you know what she wanted to be
before she lost herself in her breaking?
do you think my sons
will ever care who i was
before i broke myself for them?
o watchful mother,
the wind has cold teeth. it hungers for my breath.
no palanquin lips will bear my memory
no holy chants will echo my sainthood
no crater-carved children will weep at my grave
for i am a wicked, wayward woman.
selfish and fierce and ugly and gone
stand vigil over me, O Mother,
for no men will ever sing my gravesong.
︎
solitude
we don’t make small talk over the menus.
i sip at my coffee. the ceramic is chipped.
i trace the vein that holds the memory of its breaking,
wondering how many more hits it can take before it shatters.
i open my mouth to ask you, but
‘when did we stop liking each other?’
betrays me instead.
you shrug and say,
‘i don’t think this is what i ordered.’
i swallow coffee and loneliness.
they burn the back of my throat.
︎
when the universe big banged into
chaotic, furious existence
she knew
with all knowing
that she was hot shit
she sauntered up to god
slouched behind some dark matter bar
tucked away at the corner of Nothing and Nowhere.
she licked her blackhole lips
and ordered a drink that tasted like
exaltation.
god moves in mysterious ways
which is to say,
the good lord ain’t gonna do shit
that He don’t wanna do.
so He studied this universe, new born,
eons too young to know
her extinction would burn brighter than
her existence,
and didn’t say a Word.
‘you hear me, old man?’
she thundered in a voice that birthed
a billion billion stars, each one more
belligerent
than the last.
‘the uber’s almost here and
i gotta go’
but god,
who is not mocked and who certainly is not
rushed,
took His sweet fucking time.
who knows how much time passed —
moments, millennia —
before He finally poured a finger of sacrifice
into a shotglass,
sprinkled the chants of holy men
around the rim,
garnished the whole thing with starlight and
prayers,
and slid it to the impatient universe,
who tossed it back like
cheap whiskey and SSRIs.
god wiped her sticky fingerprints off the shotglass,
asked her if she found it
good.
‘yes,’ she said,
her voice a hymn.
‘it tastes like reflection,
it tastes like worship, like fear, like things i
do not know and things i cannot
know.
like an eternity of mirrors all lined up
to admire the forever in themselves.’
but He is god. and she is not.
and He knew her answer a long time ago.
︎
navar
we grew weed wild and rebellious under
the middle-of-nowhere sun.
sucked our baby teeth
with old-soul breath and
learned to bear the
heartbreak
of our
mothers
mothers
mothers
mothers
mothers
mo
grown grown men groped us with
words too heavy for us to wear in the summer’s
sticky-sweet.
we hunched our backs, hid our
genesis tits
peeking through mickey mouse shirts, walked
a little faster to escape the evil eyes
violating even the shadows pooling under our
heatwave steps.
beneath the sun-bleached lip of the
icee stand we slurp rainbow slush. it doesn’t
taste as sweet as we thought it would
one day when COVID isn’t COVID-ing this will be accompanied by an audio track.
skinny dipper magazine, lynn nakamura
SHE WAS A TUMBLR GRL
a growing collection of poemschrysalis
chrysalis child,
one day you will
mourn
how it felt to be
skin-soft
and
breakable
︎
moon
o mother moon
take pity on your crater-carved daughter
for i am lost. and the night is long.
o ancient mother,
was there once a story of a wayward girl
loved with all the fierceness of the prodigal son?
i have searched.
i have searched.
if such a story exists,
maybe it’s from a time before mine.
o hallowed mother,
did you break the body of the woman who bore you?
was it her screams that scattered the stars across the cosmos?
do you know what she wanted to be
before she lost herself in her breaking?
do you think my sons
will ever care who i was
before i broke myself for them?
o watchful mother,
the wind has cold teeth. it hungers for my breath.
no palanquin lips will bear my memory
no holy chants will echo my sainthood
no crater-carved children will weep at my grave
for i am a wicked, wayward woman.
selfish and fierce and ugly and gone
stand vigil over me, O Mother,
for no men will ever sing my gravesong.
︎
solitude
we don’t make small talk over the menus.
i sip at my coffee. the ceramic is chipped.
i trace the vein that holds the memory of its breaking,
wondering how many more hits it can take before it shatters.
i open my mouth to ask you, but
‘when did we stop liking each other?’
betrays me instead.
you shrug and say,
‘i don’t think this is what i ordered.’
i swallow coffee and loneliness.
they burn the back of my throat.
︎
reflection
when the universe big banged into
chaotic, furious existence
she knew
with all knowing
that she was hot shit
she sauntered up to god
slouched behind some dark matter bar
tucked away at the corner of Nothing and Nowhere.
she licked her blackhole lips
and ordered a drink that tasted like
exaltation.
god moves in mysterious ways
which is to say,
the good lord ain’t gonna do shit
that He don’t wanna do.
so He studied this universe, new born,
eons too young to know
her extinction would burn brighter than
her existence,
and didn’t say a Word.
‘you hear me, old man?’
she thundered in a voice that birthed
a billion billion stars, each one more
belligerent
than the last.
‘the uber’s almost here and
i gotta go’
but god,
who is not mocked and who certainly is not
rushed,
took His sweet fucking time.
who knows how much time passed —
moments, millennia —
before He finally poured a finger of sacrifice
into a shotglass,
sprinkled the chants of holy men
around the rim,
garnished the whole thing with starlight and
prayers,
and slid it to the impatient universe,
who tossed it back like
cheap whiskey and SSRIs.
god wiped her sticky fingerprints off the shotglass,
asked her if she found it
good.
‘yes,’ she said,
her voice a hymn.
‘it tastes like reflection,
it tastes like worship, like fear, like things i
do not know and things i cannot
know.
like an eternity of mirrors all lined up
to admire the forever in themselves.’
but He is god. and she is not.
and He knew her answer a long time ago.
︎
navar
we grew weed wild and rebellious under
the middle-of-nowhere sun.
sucked our baby teeth
with old-soul breath and
learned to bear the
heartbreak
of our
mothers
mothers
mothers
mothers
mothers
mo
grown grown men groped us with
words too heavy for us to wear in the summer’s
sticky-sweet.
we hunched our backs, hid our
genesis tits
peeking through mickey mouse shirts, walked
a little faster to escape the evil eyes
violating even the shadows pooling under our
heatwave steps.
beneath the sun-bleached lip of the
icee stand we slurp rainbow slush. it doesn’t
taste as sweet as we thought it would
SHE IS A RAP STAR
sometimes i write silly songs after i’ve taken my sleeping pillone day when COVID isn’t COVID-ing this will be accompanied by an audio track. SHE WAS KINDA PUBLISHED ONCE
it’s like i’m exclusive instead of untalented.skinny dipper magazine, lynn nakamura