I’m trying to see how to slow time
and reconcile dimensions with crime
but I keep condensing the days.
I eat one meal a day like a snake.
I must change my life
give up to the wave pool portal, drink bleach.

You confirm we’re in June double digits already
I still don’t get Hollywood
how he made her eat her sliced off tattoo.
Summer’s not here yet/feels like the end
I don’t wash my hair/wait to descend to the lake.

In England I was skinny
neo-Romantic/fell asleep easy
Katharine Hepburn died/they asked when I was leaving.
It stayed light until midnight
plastic ponies and fruit.

Hampstead Heath I transcended
no one owned my religion
Fourth of July, I sat in a coat closet
loved the scent of the laundry detergent
your ghost was soap on a rope.

Now I touch myself    guideless/guileless
cry at the light
cows appear out of nowhere
dropped from outer space maybe
in time I’ll cry at cicadas
the sight of a 1999 mix CD, the cosmos
wave to such cows in only my bra.



Knit a row, think hello
you knew January once
precision tips lie unfamiliar
now I’m focused on the circle-jerk jinx
riding headless on pink ice
now the devil stole my needle
now I’m focused on the slitter/glitter blimp of noir musicals
or the safety blanket
now my voice-activated computer is in love with me
it has a place for my eyeshadow
a daisy-shaped emery board
and sometimes I unplug it
go out in the snow
to dig up your cocktail dress   or his marcasite watch
and the quilters complain
how they never show Catholic mass in films anymore
and I take it with yarn weight
and listen to new wave and think.
I go out in sub-zero drunk
let my feet freeze
increase stitch/decrease          my witch-sister thirst
I take too many pills
my mouth is as dry as the straw
in Spot’s doghouse                 how we left him outside all winter
stayed inside to watch
Samantha/Serena dance against backgrounds
like hullaballoo                       shitty predictive text
those words are not yours
and should we keep our hair orange?
and this blend of naturalism
and 50s Technicolor
and we don’t care about skin care
and we’re anti lip-gloss
and his dick like a rocket
and bang, bang, bang on the door baby
and all of us dying
our bushes hot pink.

Notes: “You come and go” is from “Karma Chameleon” by Culture Club. “Bang, bang, bang on the door baby” is from “Love Shack” by The B-52s.


Jessie Janeshek's full-length collections are MADCAP (Stalking Horse Press, 2019), The Shaky Phase (Stalking Horse Press, 2017), and Invisible Mink (Iris Press, 2010). Her chapbooks include Spanish Donkey/Pear of Anguish (Grey Book Press, 2016), Rah-Rah Nostalgia (dancing girl press, 2016), Supernoir (Grey Book Press, 2017), Auto-Harlow (Shirt Pocket Press, 2018), and Channel U (Grey Book Press, 2020). Read more at jessiejaneshek.net.