THREE POEMS by NAT RAUM
why remember when you can forget?
hollow front teeth pulse against a perfect cup of tea, peach and spearmint and lemongrass brewed with too much honey and far too hot, encased in a babypink bass pro shops mug. the playoffs paint my room in regal purple light and i choke through vaporsmoke until my head spins. why is it sunday? why am i afraid of my pilot light? why do nfl commentators need to be on a first name basis with every quarterback? why is it twenty degrees? five years ago i’d have drank a beer or six to warm up. now i use sensodyne toothpaste and wince when i take my nighttime tea, and instead of passing out, the citylight expires around me until i am the only thing stirring besides dustydry air through the radiator. i used to be good at this. memory used to find me happy and if not, i’d just fall asleep, surrender the act of remembering. why feel when you can lay stiff and silent?
there’s nothing in california that you could not learn to hate here
After “Flying Model Rockets”rocket whines skyward, scatters sparks
onto dry bluegrass, induces heart palpitations.
there may not be droughts in virginia
right now but i bite my thumbnails
and await a forest fire while rocket reaches
peak, parachutes gently to lakeshore
as stasis surrounds me, grips each limb
with enough fervor to bruise. (don’t get me
wrong, i like marks from zealous thumbs
on my thighs as much as the next guy—
this is just a different kind of hunger.)
sky glazes itself with dusk, paleyellow
rippling off glassy water
until it’s gone.
i personally think it’s too cold to have the windows open
After “Awkward Conversations”i love what you’ve done: sucked mint juleps
and fernet and cola through your lungs
like smoke, greedythirsty as a gazelle
guzzling pondwater in the desert. shiver
in the dark, in the frame of a window
you accidentally left open. i love the way
you grip a teacup (so gingerly) with pinky
extended (now that’s fancy), the way you
flip over an LP with one finger on each
side like it’s a precious heirloom. light
my marlboro green with the safety matches
in your patchwork bag; scatter our breaths
through the darkening sky as we exhale
cirrus wisps into the night.
nat raum (they/them) has seen over 200 episodes of the House Hunters franchise. They remember almost none of it.