all the good poems these days
by Nicole Callihan
seem to be about caves and ladies hunkering down in them
or groping around the wet dark opening I tell my students
if you run your hand along the wall for long enough
you’ll probably find a light switch but I tell them all sorts of things
tonight Eva is riding the Zamboni I like how Zamboni
rhymes with pony and I like the dusk and the way
it gets dark so early that’s a lie now I will tell you lies
all the good poems these days tell lies not really that’s a lie
is it it is is it I haven’t been in a cave in years actually
I’m not sure I’ve ever been in a cave or if I’m remembering
watching Goonies in the half-light I have a memory of riding
horses in the snow in South Dakota the pines buckled
my crotch ached my mother says it never happened
and by it I mean everything everything never happened
nothing ever happened these days poets say they want to curse
in all their poems and talk about politics and some other poets say
they have no desire for syntax or sex because the world is so
and then they curse and point towards the sky in high school
this girl Abby said she was trying to get her bf to do her
but he kept pointing to the ceiling god she asked is it god
but he was talking about her parents upstairs sleeping
or maybe not sleeping maybe just listening for the sound
of their daughter not being done being undone today for lunch
I packed Ella shrimp cocktail and three tiny apples all the good
poems these days have shrimps I told Zoe I wish I could write
poems for my daughters also I'm going to tell you now
because I keep forgetting to tell anyone in real life
so all I have is this life but what I'm going to tell you is that
I've seen three shooting stars in the past month this makes me
think that either something really good is about to happen
or the sky is bottoming out in china fireflies are harvested
and you can buy tickets to go to the park and watch their lights
what I'm asking is would you buy a ticket all the good poems
these days sell tickets if you buy this one I'll rub your temples
and sing you a song and nobody will never have to know
or groping around the wet dark opening I tell my students
if you run your hand along the wall for long enough
you’ll probably find a light switch but I tell them all sorts of things
tonight Eva is riding the Zamboni I like how Zamboni
rhymes with pony and I like the dusk and the way
it gets dark so early that’s a lie now I will tell you lies
all the good poems these days tell lies not really that’s a lie
is it it is is it I haven’t been in a cave in years actually
I’m not sure I’ve ever been in a cave or if I’m remembering
watching Goonies in the half-light I have a memory of riding
horses in the snow in South Dakota the pines buckled
my crotch ached my mother says it never happened
and by it I mean everything everything never happened
nothing ever happened these days poets say they want to curse
in all their poems and talk about politics and some other poets say
they have no desire for syntax or sex because the world is so
and then they curse and point towards the sky in high school
this girl Abby said she was trying to get her bf to do her
but he kept pointing to the ceiling god she asked is it god
but he was talking about her parents upstairs sleeping
or maybe not sleeping maybe just listening for the sound
of their daughter not being done being undone today for lunch
I packed Ella shrimp cocktail and three tiny apples all the good
poems these days have shrimps I told Zoe I wish I could write
poems for my daughters also I'm going to tell you now
because I keep forgetting to tell anyone in real life
so all I have is this life but what I'm going to tell you is that
I've seen three shooting stars in the past month this makes me
think that either something really good is about to happen
or the sky is bottoming out in china fireflies are harvested
and you can buy tickets to go to the park and watch their lights
what I'm asking is would you buy a ticket all the good poems
these days sell tickets if you buy this one I'll rub your temples
and sing you a song and nobody will never have to know
Nicole Callihan’s books include SuperLoop (Sockmonkey Press 2014), and the chapbooks: A Study in Spring (2015), The Deeply Flawed Human (2016), and Downtown (2017). Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Sixth Finch, Plume, Painted Bride Quarterly, The American Poetry Review, and as a Poem-a-Day selection from the Academy of American Poets. Her next project, Translucence, a dual-language, cross-culture collaboration with poet Samar Abdel Jaber, who writes in Arabic, will be published by Indolent Books in 2018. Find her on the web at www.nicolecallihan.com.
