Alison Bell Miller

 Frazzled Mom Poet Ruins Sandwich For Self
            Title by Jaret Ferratusco

I wanted a salad with a hard-boiled egg for lunch so much that I went downstairs early, started boiling water against the persistent yet pleasant balcony breeze and considered buying my third

egg maker. I tossed the wilting romaine and spinach to the chickens only to confirm the suspicion I’d forgotten, that the iceberg lettuce for the kids who now hate all other greens

was fucking cabbage. I asked if they’d prefer turkey sandwiches or Ramen but one was
deafened by her shower/hair/bathtub routine so I made sandwiches. We were out

of sliced cheddar. I said we’re out of sliced cheddar SO I gave you the good stuff BUT it’s crumbly. I almost googled how to make a salad without greens. I have lots of wraps, have been

experimenting with wraps, ones made of eggs, ones made of paper, and onto them all I drip
the water that comes before the spicy brown mustard. I wrapped a silly combination of shit

into one, no tomato because there was no lettuce, finally stood up from the table, daughter
still in shower, and said something’s got to change. I bisected a cluster of cherry tomatoes,

reminded my son to put his dishes into the dishwasher and tossed my wrap to the chickens.

 

Kangaroos Don’t Go For the Headlights

It’s just that they hunt at dusk when it ’s hard to see. They intend to jump out of a vehicle ’s way, but, disoriented, they sometimes jump into the light.

Kangaroos have two sets of nipples in their pouches, the man who took my virginity tells me
30 years later. They ’re pregnant all the time.

We ’re sitting on the cliffs of Southern California, smoking hand-rolled tobacco and weed. He ’s wearing a self-made leather hat and vest and we ’re laughing. 

Otters hold hands while sleeping so they don ’t float apart. A garden snail can have up to 14,000 teeth. An ostrich ’s eyes are bigger than its brain.

We walk hand in hand to his hotel where he tattoos a poppy on my leg, singing songs from 1992.

Because of their long feet and large tail, kangaroos can ’t move backwards.

 

10 Reasons Why Donating your Body to a Serial Killer Might Not be an Effective Form of Suicide

1. Usually by the time a serial killer has been identified they are in police custody

2. Even if you took out an ad for the serial killer, they would probably think it was a trap

3. Also, with the ad, you risk drawing the attention of well-meaning people such as the authorities and those who care about you

4. Encourages bad behavior (debatable) and

5. doesn’t necessarily save the life of someone else

6. You won’t know when to expect it

7. or if you will be tortured

8. Undermines actual victims and their families

9. If you want people to know that your death was a suicide and/or why you chose it, you will have a harder time being believed

10. Might not appeal to the serial killer

 

Alison Bell Miller (she/her) is a writer and sex educator. She has published two chapbooks, Flowering, (adj.) by Weasel Press and blink by BarBar Press. Her work has also been published in various literary magazines including Hobart Pulp, Anti-Heroin Chic, Ariel Chart, and Cultural Daily. The owner of sex positive adult boutiques in Richmond, Virginia, she currently resides in San Diego.