Last night I dreamed of ferocious drinking
with you. Once we did cocaine off the basement
floor in that dorm on Mass. Ave., the one
like a fortress or wall, & other things
but mostly we drank. I could taste
the wheaty bitterness of a beer I never liked
& the thirst in my throat curled my hands, thirst
inherited from myself, whip of child-eyes eating
saltwaterair & needing. My drink drinks
sticky beer sap drinks urinal cake
dew and Jäger’s wild herb mostly it drinks
the coldest scoop of air at the bottom
of the wind’s throat. It wears fraying slippers
leathersoled, soft as ear broken as mulch,
slip slip taps down every windblown urgent
path. Cousin to the hull of my fastest
boat, to the slick skin of water on my
own, cousin to every insideout mouth
& the flayed skin of whatever hates
itself and wants to swallow the world. Only
satisfied as the throat closes and feels
the next swallow pile on top of it. Who
else gentles this desire.
No one, it’s mine.
Leah Claire Kaminski’s poems appear or are forthcoming in Boston Review, Massachusetts Review, Prairie Schooner, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. Author of three chapbooks (Harbor Editions, Milk & Cake Press, Dancing Girl Press) and an Editorial Assistant at Seneca Review, she lives in Chicago. Find out more at leahkaminski.com
