panic button
woke up
happy- early to work
for once
looked at cakes, carousels in windows
thought about rings, your cum,
my face
I don’t know what happened
all of the sudden
I had this gnawing feeling
that God is very small
by noon, texting you:
hello
Hello?
I need you
I want you to beat me up
hello
I know I’m being crazy I’m trying
not to be
please pick up
stress
last night my teeth fell out of my face
I told my boyfriend and he said
that it’s common it just means
I’m insecure afraid of losing and I mean
I am and I talk about it all the time
but how does he know that how does everyone
know that
paros
I have a personality disorder, so I don’t
have a strong sense of self
but at Panagia Ekatontapillani
a church dating back
to Justinian’s reign on a small
island in the cyclades
there is a saint’s tomb
and on that tomb is a porcelain doll
with a blue dress and brunette curls
just like the one my grandmother gifted me
many years ago
and the day she is moved
is the day my spirit leaves my body
I’m sure of it
reading kharms at the beach, covered in hives
a meditation on jaws
not the film
clingy
I wrap my legs
around your leg I have been
going to the gym lately using
the elliptical so my legs have been getting strong I
say I want to sew my body
to your body like the human centipede
I have never seen that movie but I’m pretty sure
that’s what it’s about
all my love is violent
metamorphosis
everything is ending
all the time
to be human is to engage in cruelty daily
my house sits in a sea of blood,
all of ours do
Sophia Tempest Parsons is a poet based in Austin, Texas. Her first chapbook, A LAMB HANGS BY ITS OWN FOOT, was released with Ghost City Press in 2019. Tempest is her real middle name.