Fragments from Lalaland

Three Poems I Left Out of "Take Fountain"

I bite my nails and peel the skin from my lips as I wait for Amazon’s self-publishing algorithms to approve my “low content” poetry collection.

What if it gets rejected by a blind machine that doesn’t know how to read?

I scroll through hundreds of poems that didn’t make it into the book.
I choose three at random, like opening the Tao Te Ching for instruction.

I land here:

Gift Boy

I gifted him a lick of spit,
a moment of lust—
amuse-bouche

He didn’t know shit
from Malibu to Marina del Rey

Heard through the grapevine:
he choked
on sticky-sweet love bombs
and vanished like a ghost

He kept his towels neatly folded

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Belly Portals

Late for lunch at the Thai place—

Instead of erotic innuendos,
I get a monologue
about my intestines.

He says my belly button
opens portals,
bleeds into my toes,
drives a needle
into my heart chakra.

He makes his own pants.

They shimmer like fish scales.

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Venus in Paneer

“I want to hold you so tight it hurts,”
he says.

But I hear caged birds
three hours ahead,
our shared dark slightly misaligned.

His voice softens until I lean in
just to keep it real.

I am a Venus in paneer,
dreaming saffron tea,
curry kisses,
rice pudding with anise.

I say, “I get bored easily,”
and wonder
where that leaves us.

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