phobos and deimos

phobos and deimos

By Jillian Thomas

i am forever awaiting the dropping 

of the other shoe; surely phobos and deimos have craters that can only be filled by my fetal position 

i have learned to tiptoe daintily around the salted pillars one saintly confession from collapse 

i operate on the marionette 

strings of the gargoyles seething through the fourth dimension, 

liminal spaces existing outside a poem, 

birthing the unknown, a saintly ingenue 

i sleep with one of everything open, 

vacancy for midnight conjurings i 

seem to forget when morning covers her breast; my dreams seem almost alcoholic, 

fermented from my crazed sobriety 

but perhaps it was only a fever nightmare, 

sickly half-formed embryos 

mutilating my coherence until it was crucified and i am forced to 

nurture its dead weight with sugar water 

until it is sweetened enough 

to return to consciousness

it is not only in my slumber that the gargoyles appear or the wine is dripped 

between my gums, no it has nestled itself 

in my dwindling telomeres

i have reconciled with the fact that 

the shoe i am wearing has a partner in the sky, looking for my feet then 

aiming for my head