Kayla Sargeson

Meditations on the Corner of Your Cardigan     

Three yellow cabs in a row.
A lesbian couple pushing a stroller.
I’ve never been the kind of woman with dreams like that:
white-picket-fence-two-smelly-babies-and-a-dog bullshit.
I’d like to go to Tahiti because it’s fun to say.
I like to dye my hair pink because.
Empty Dos Equis bottles make me happy.
Not to mention the pills I take to sleep
and wake up.
A man’s tattoo, in block print: Even you can be happy.
I forgot to tell you
that you look nice in that green cardigan, how
it brings out your eyes I pretend not to know the color of:
a kind of brown-green, but not hazel.
I trace the veins in your hand with my mind,
the slight crease in your cheek.
I’ve spent the past year memorizing your face.
I finally don’t care that you don’t know mine.

 

Kayla Sargeson has studied with the poets Jan Beatty, Tony Trigilio, and D. A. Powell. Her chapbook Mini Love Gun was recently published by Main Street Rag. Her poems appear or are forthcoming from 5 AM, Columbia Poetry Review, and Chiron Review.