Poetry by Pepper Cunningham

                Abe Bingham CC




​Equinox at the Dixie Quick Stop

I am vomiting breakfast tacos and a decade of shame
              on the first day of bluebonnet season
behind a gas station in Johnson City.

From the tinny music piped through the speakers,
              Willie Nelson advises that the road goes on forever 
and the party never ends.

Party’s over, Willie. I want to throw up 
              my hands and admit defeat.
I don’t have the guts.

I peel off the sticker on a rotting banana 
              freckled as my exposed 
shoulders. I need something more

on my stomach aside from the Equinox, 
              a milky brew of espresso and horchata 
now astrally-projectile-vomited in the parking lot.

I hold back
              my hair and inhale exhaust 
and scattered seeds. I keep everything down

but it always sprouts back up.
              Yesterday’s bourbon and bits of bile mingle 
on the pavement like old buds

running into each other at the bar 
              with nothing much in common anymore
except the good ol’ days.

68 miles to go. This expanse of US 290-W stretches 
              and yawns. Wasted peaches squish
beneath my boots, shriveled and befuzzed.

My phone buzzes in staccato shivers;
              Mom wants me to shake a leg. 
Oh no wouldn’t wanna be late to rehab haha eye roll emoji

I’m being sent away. I can’t talk.
              Something’s come up
and I need another shot

to prove myself wrong.
              There’s more I need to get out.
I shove my fingers down my throat

for the last gasp, once more, with feeling, 
              the final shuddering sigh
of astronomical winter. I wipe my mouth 

and pick at a purple thread splitting at the seams 
              of my sundress. I patched it up 
last week, again,

but it’s threatening to unravel, again.






​Easy Does It

Three years and a continent 
from recovery, I plant
myself on the grass, drink 
two liters of boxed merlot, unlock 
my phone, and call my baby brother
a motherfucker.

I wake to tequila sunrises
over an empty garden wet 
with dew and slushpuddles
and every bit of scorched earth,
every shard of eggshell 
stuck in my soles.
 
I pick them out
one by one. I compost 
them with coffee grounds
and progress, not perfection.
I whisper to the dirt
I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.


​

Pepper (she/her) is a writer and teacher who hails from Texas but now calls home the mountains of Vilcabamba, Ecuador. She spends her free time writing by the river, making collages, and marveling at the sheer amount of unrecognizable beetles and butterflies that live in her garden. Pepper is currently the Translation Editor at MAYDAY Magazine. She can be found on Instagram @jonibitchell_ and Twitter @pepwriteswords.

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