The Poet’s Leftovers in Love by Majella Votta
how to kiss a city/summer shedding/ a mid-morning bagel
The last time we talked you made me cry
And I spent a week after wondering
why I had let you and
when did we become so wretched
Talking red/ubiquity/my mother’s tongue
I never understood the silence of it;
How it occurred to no one that maybe youth isn’t a weapon.
Alas, there we were trading ours arms,
Swapping skins for security - the sirens are a quiet thrum between us.
scales/Prince’s Dirty Mind/turning twenty-three
Donna said it’s poetic tragedy,
I see it only as a dampened version of August,
cancelled plans for twisted bedsheets.
But we were only doing what we knew best; maybe.
Velour vomit/snail mail/sleepytime peach tea
There’s a ghost town trapped in my skull
The hush of the muse,
Your ligaments incognito searching for clamour and grace.
Aldi sangria/your brother’s sticky car/worn anthologies
So let the billionaires stay in space
I’m not sure we’re up for the mission.
Majella Votta is a New Jersey-born law student living in Cork City, Ireland. She is a former national Poetry Aloud winner. She enjoys telling people she works in a library, and pretending to be good at chess.