When The Cowgirls Stop Riding

Alexis Pope
· in ,

I avoid you like a house with no coffee. There is no dancing, only horses, only Eskimo kisses on sun stained noses, only my ten-gallon hat.
When you approach, I gallop towards the sunset like cockroaches. My wings are bruised and barely moving. I’m the fly caught between the window and the screen. Lift me closer to the light.
My skin echoes. I’m a bus with no passengers. Feed me your weakness like I’d prune without it. In the dark the bulb is bare and light is a moth of remembrance, like when I remember you and burn for hours.
There was once a flame in your ribcage. There is now an empty parking lot behind your eyes. I am the beaten dog, my leg dragging behind. I keep to corners and eat when you aren’t watching.

Alexis Pope lives in Ohio. Her work can be found in PANK, >kill author, Midwestern Gothic, decomP, NAP, Ilk, and elsewhere. She is co-curator of THE BIG BIG MESS READING SERIES.