Poetry by Makenna Dykstra

             ​Will Folsom CC




CW: mention of drinking/alcohol/substances
give peas a chance

has it ever rained
on moving day? /

trek a mattress
through the thunder / and

later that night / sleep
on the sky’s leftovers

/ bruised peach skin /
the same as a room

i can hardly enter / for
fear of falling through

the floor / a crack
in the wall / reminds

you of a lobster you
once stared at / through

supermarket glass / i
pitied it in a strange

accent / that realized
my own slow boil / tear

me to pieces in pursuit
of human tenderness

/ hanging skeletons /
another version of

flight / and a misplaced
step / catapults me

into the unbound
sunset / bleached and

pink / so you know / who
to blame / i promise you

/ easy dreaming / the kind
untortured by a bed / sour

with sexed misgivings /
a broken pocket watch

ticks / the same minute
in the corner / the water

one degree from
bubbling / hot enough

to burn / but not yet
sterile / i sometimes wonder

how long i can say
“good enough” / before

it’s not / my darts never
hit the board / unless

i’m drunk / which i think
says something / about

how much you can trust
me / the chair wobbles

but holds / long enough
for me to fill my plate





CW: mention of de*th 
between the lightning strike and the thunderclap is eternal

i wake in the night to thunderstorms around me.
               a flood of water and dream beg me with a soft hand

to the riverbank to drink nectar-sweet immortality.
               lyrics of a song linger on my back traced in cosmic forthcomings

the raspy lilt sounds eerily like my mother,
               until it bites my tongue and leaves me to spit red

in the sink the next morning alone.

moon-stained and frothing with melody,
               i plead fool to my higher intellect.

surrender: eyes shut and palms up. i beg relief.
                revive the written word in every hue.

show me my face again before i forget.

under a sky bleached with hauntology, i cloak apathy
                in kindness while i wither half-shelled.

martyrdom can’t be self-prescribed, much less in a rainstorm.
               the damp thwarts every attempt to strike the flint.

the executioner’s work to protect the burgeoning flame
               gives me time to conjure last words worthy of remembering.

in the amputated light, i am an unbecome self.

i wake up still panting from sprinting towards a forgotten note
               that slips like water between tightly bound fingers.

i forget running never brought me anywhere
               but to a cliff’s edge, lured to leap into the waiting expanse below.

i’ll tell you it’s in pursuit of relief for my sore shins,
               but we both know i was born and i woke in the sea.

it’s only a matter of time before i die there.

               but there’s no one to die for, dance with, or god forbid kiss.
only a deluge ready and willing to sweep me off my feet.

human’s most primal state was never savagery, but vulnerability.

i often think of the mortal who, unable to control their lust,
               gazed upon zeus’ glory and was rewarded with perpetual dark.

which is to say, beauty must be finite.
               which is to say, there’s beauty to be discovered.

which is to say, at the risk of death, carry on.





so this is how it ends

knowing is a series of deaths in your twenties
& somehow the streaks of flies that linger

on my windshield from three states ago
teach me more about honor than the God

who opens the door for a man on crutches.
in a random café off interstate 10, twin skeletons

share a lighter. smoke drifts through the hollow
of their chest like breath. under the cover of night

the tributes to last week’s storms are exhumed.
weaken & meet. the still-breathing are forced

to inhale the damp & scrabble to hold
their grip while the earth shifts into place

again. consumption has no witness but the lines
of a shaky finger twisting through the sand.

memorialize a litany of goodbyes for tomorrow’s
child to mourn in the gaping absence

of connection. under the amputated light of dawn,
i turn & curse the pebble that carved my unwitting

signature in the continent’s face, carried miles
under the weight of a glacier until the sun bid

its freedom. loving after all is melting. which,
by any other name, is disappearance.


​

Makenna Dykstra (she/her) is an M.A. student of English literature at Tulane University where she calls New Orleans, LA home. She is an avid lover of anything peanut butter chocolate and jellyfish, though enjoys them best in separate contexts. She can often be found on Twitter @makdykstra or in the local parks, writing, reading, or admiring the oak trees.