Lobotomy #2 Wishlist
By Julian Magee
In my dreams our interrogation rooms are perfect,
carved atop a skyscraper or a gas station or your staircase.
You always tell me about your thousand dollar stare,
and I always say something different than I was hoping to.
Your jaw pokes out through the drapes,
and when I reach out to close it, you kiss my wrist.
It’s a kind of strange mercy you choose for me.
Some nights I remember the morning your dog died,
and crashing into a palm tree so you wouldn’t have to grieve,
and the twenty-two bruised walks to the post office,
and what it was like to push your shoulders into the earth,
crashing my chest into yours, feeling so tumid
because you were smiling with closed eyes,
and your trust mutilated me.
And then by the time my arms are shattered,
he’s already there by you, only his fourth time,
twisting parts that I tried so hard to fuck
and the drapes swallow all of the sound but I can tell
that one of the great American conversations is unfurling.
If he ever leaves, he does so unceremoniously,
and your silhouette turns back like it was always facing me.
Eventually a swollen sun starts setting,
and you leave your napkin on the table to go inside,
to pace about and be yourself, or throw up, I don’t know,
and I would like to follow you but I am the empty water glass,
flush between the salad fork and the bread plate you frowned at.
When you come back your hair is cut
so much shorter than I’ll ever get to see it.
The Trinity Review 