BRITTANY DENNISON
hairsbreath
i aim to be luxe by the end
clothes of animal skin to keep the skin in
bejeweled with sores
and still smelling like a neon peach
walking through saks fifth avenune
feeling not at all like i’m crashing a wedding
with a well-groomed vocabulary
breasts hard as rocks from hearing the words
cream lily
admittedly as i write this poem
i am regretfully nude
but one day
when the sky’s the color of cotton pajamas
i’ll be embalmed in lotion
lithe and limp
snug inside a supple leather watchband
with a mouthful of ribbons
and after my ascent into heaven,
the last fumes from the vial,
just throw the damn packaging away
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*** ** ***
JULY 16TH, 2015
An old woman with her shirt falling off
escorted out of a police car and into the nursing home across from my apartment
Welcome home or welcome back
I don’t know where to look
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*** ** ***
EURYDICE
My brilliant older professor boyfriend took me to see a modern adaptation of Eurydice downtown because it was written by his brilliant college chum and when I couldn’t stop crying during the scene in which Eurydice’s father makes Eurydice a house out of string in hell even though she has no memory of him my brilliant older professor boyfriend didn’t put his arm around me and don’t you know I didn’t cry when I left him
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*** ** ***
DEAD PHONE IN NEW YORK CITY
I am confident that I can remember my way back to Natasha’s house
On the train, a woman’s beautiful shoes are beautiful
and strike me as utterly horrible
and alienating to someone who doesn’t know what shoes are
I can’t remember the way back to Natasha’s house
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*** ** ***
A WEEKEND WITHOUT TECHNO
For Simone
6:30am she is awake from being previously asleep
Cold hair and walls
Simone takes slow steps from her bed to the window
There’s coffee
What else
Milk and fruit
Could fill an hour or more of the day, but not yet
She wraps the blanket closer and is silent through the silence
A shower could take an hour too
What else what else,
What else to do today
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BRITTANY DENNISON
Brittany Dennison is a poet from St. Louis and Seattle, and currently lives in New York where she works at New Directions. She has poems forthcoming in The Literary Review and Electric Literature, and has been published in Gramma, The West Wind Review, Abraham Lincoln, and Pacifica Literary Review.
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A Dozen Nothing 