Five Poems | Jennifer Hill

Nonfuture Tense Portrait

Ah, lucky to be here, at last.

Thank you.

My hair cries into my neck.

My collarbone plows the air.

My pelvis is a chemical burn.

My feet insist on the ground.

As soon as I’ve arrived,

I love all your faces

and I want to leave.

Ah, lucky to be here, at last.

Thank you.

I count my breaths at night.

I ignore my heartbeat during the day.

I shave off what no one wants.

I blend in with my blood type.

As soon as I’ve arrived,

I will leave.

I love your face.

I’m sorry.

Believe me, assume,

I’m embarrassed by all of me,

every drippy syllable.

When I read me, all my muscles

tense, sphincter clamps shut.

I should have said eyelid,

not asshole.

I’m not a nasty person,

I could be your sister,

and I know I am

lucky to be here, at last.

Thank you for this body of work.

I will finish.

I have finished.

I will be finished,

and return

so you’ll hear

my footsteps

by yesterday.

Malaprop

Somewhere, someone’s tongue

is being cut out so they can’t

say the worm that gets

into the fears of the other side.

It is unseasonably war outside.

All language closes in on strange,

strangle, a burn of roadside tangle

and conglomeration of endings,

the beginnings, you learn,

are crossed wires, an SOS.

Somehow, somewhere,

quelque chose, how do you say

it is so hot my house exhales

ash each mourning.

Je suis si loin de toi.

I'm a nervous shakedown

as I drive to work trying

to recall, now do you say,

Do you have a book of poetry?

The light is red.

I wait.

La lumiere est rouge.

J’attendre.

La lumière est vert.

J’attendre.

A pause caused

by anti-revelation,

un rêve of the head

dreaming of itself

having a dream

about making sense.

This is where it turns

very Americaine as the 18

wheeler careens through

the intersection where

j’attendre.

Or, wait. I waited?

J’ai attendu.

I was waiting?

J’attendais.

Tense wires crossed.

How do you say

I could have been killed

but I was left to live,

vivant aux États-Unis?

My torso is still

attached to my head.

I know it makes no sense,

une mystère,

the colloquial,

it’s just how it is.

We call it a close call,

une énigme criblée,

a riddle riddled

with a kindness of hurt.

Disrememberment

Know neither:

Where you are going

or how to feel.

Recall a morning

without a word.

The long O of silence.

This is how you began —

an unnoticed preface

in an obsolete dictionary

with 88 words for love.

What you should be:

Asking.

What you want to be:

A smaller quantity,

lesser than.

What you are:

Pieces of a whole —

an extravagant head,

all thought and yawp.

Responsibilities.

Know neither:

The long O of preface

An unnoticed silence

Recall what you should be asking.

How did you begin to want to be

a word without a morning?

How is thought extravagant?

Neither know feeling

or going. Remember less, be all

words for love. Don’t say love.

Stand in the middle of obsolete —

just so. Want lesser still:

o.

Slef Portrait

For today, I’m alive in this inky flask

with its ingenious flatness of aging.

Is it useful noting toenail fungus?

All ten tunes that foul my finale

as I fade, tire of tenuous flings.

Oh the ingenious flatness of aging,

a sanguine flout in the flaky face,

the mind’s sky full of asks that flay.

It’s a blessed kink, a jink to rash over,

caulk every scar, every scare.

Oh, the ingenious flatness of aging.

Did I mention my fat knuckles,

a set that lacks, a fact that sets

me to sulk? I have a knack for funk

now, less fun than flu or the lankest fuck.

Oh ingenious flatness of aging —

I’m alive in this inky flask. For today.

Textbook Subtext

It’s a long time coming, you said.

Say something without saying it.

Let croci bloom in the Broca.

Keep it simple, for the pollination

of hesitation. Wait, then work without

knowing what it is you’re doing —

one eye sees, one is closed, and the third

creates.

Dig for months in silence for a bitter root

inside of you, let your nail beds cake

with the dirt of your thoughts

until any point you once had

is clammy as a halved worm.

There it is. See it glistening,

all sun-smacked and writhing?

Bring it up now.

It’s a long time coming.

Jennifer Hill is a poet, circus performer, and arts educator who has worked with the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts for 23 years. You can find her at actsofjennius.com