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That

I grew up with pickles. I slept in

the attic (cigarettes, sheets laced with

smoke). The heat of my father’s

brother’s old room. Larry Blackmon

painted for effect & Chaka Khan’s lips

more like a kiss if a kiss could walk

when it came to life. If a kiss

could have hips & legs & ass—

well, I wanted that.

& if the colors could sweat & strip

me down to my slip, well,

I wanted that, too. Nobody knew

what I was thinking up there.

Though, maybe, they wanted that. That.

from You Don’t Have to Go to Mars for LoveFind more by Yona Harvey at the library

Copyright © 2020 Yona Harvey
Used with the permission of The Permissions Company, LLC on behalf of Four Way Books.

Published in Poems Yona Harvey

This program is supported in part by a grant from the Idaho Humanities Council, a State-based program of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

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