Tara Teeling

How strange it is to wake in a foreign land,
To try to spy the sameness here, as it was there.
Suddenly, nothing feels close, nothing in my acquaintance.
I look around and see things that should be familiar to me.
...

It’s after midnight,
and the snow is unmarred,
free from angels and stomping feet.
The flakes that fall are like
...

It may have been the long hair,
the way the honey-brown curls
undulated while he moved,
rubbing me in all the good places,
...

While staring at an innocent yellow wall,
I decide I want my first kiss back.
It was mine, and it was wasted
on a boy without a face.
...

I lie awake in the deep blues and soft creams
A long day, tucked in tight
Aching muscles, tight scalp, weary eyes
Requiem for consciousness undisturbed
...

On the roof, outside the window
are glare crusted humpbacked whales,
carved by the unforgiving wind of early March
as it pushed through the last breaths
...

Not everyone
is meant to be more
than ordinary, you say.
...

Blue nightgown, you’ve served me well.
With your delicate white flowers
and flirtation with maidenhood,
you gave me many nights
...

Your perfumed words and rose-petal theories
have long since lost their potency, as have you.
The wine has turned to water, and there is no
salt with which to tempt my tongue.
...

Sitting in the chair
with its threadbare bruises,
I am home. The earlier-crimson cushions
look bled dry, hosting the smells
...

I’m a queen and a dream. I move
in grinding glitter and wanton sighs,
fluent in guttural growl.
My colour is green, and I’m a Scorpio
...

Sometimes,
I think what I need,
is for a stranger to slowly braid my hair
while I listen to a soft voice
...

Falling white velvet,
vanilla eiderdown,
wafts toward the sleeping earth
all without a sound.
...

Tell me about your tragedy.
Spread it all over me,
layer over layer,
like buttercream frosting
...

An old question
rises up in an argument,
like lava or hot soup in a pot.
...

I am from glass bottles,
from Swatch Watches and an age without seatbelts.
I am from a bungalow with ruffled
curtains blowing in the kitchen window.
...

You have no right to haunt me.

I didn’t ask for this,
the lingering soul of something
...

The fear of each looming moment
is over before you had a chance to
know it in your lungs, on your skin.
It regenerates, comes alive and walks
...

Fat Girl

A fat girl stands on the corner,
the belt on her pants like a ring around Saturn,
...

Your anguish is in my blood
and it gives me breath,
erasing my various maladies
and self-inflicted afflictions.
...