Gnomes and Snarls

Jessie Janeshek

Brass blonde I harbored                                   diseases that summer
    encyclopedic gunpowder
            prescriptions delivered             whatever you wanted
my humor mistreated                           massaging the data
            Tinkerbell travertine and swimming pool smell
                                    whenever you watched.

Do you believe in that state when a war poem
            starts to move forward?
  Dry air, dust muses, a deadball wonderland
            the short stop’s house built
                                                in the side of the hill?

His fat older brother wears a green diamond snake.
                        The dinosaur reaches               in the dream window
                        gobbles my uniform                 licking in Spanish
                                                and the fresh garbage
                                                while I brush my teeth.

Do you believe I screamed I’m back!
This is only a draft
and that shimmered, reptilian?

                                    He jammed my head in the porch swing and fucked.
                                    He told me I needed a humbling.