“#ANXIETY” / “#NECK” / “#SORROW” by Heather Sweeney

 
#NECK _ #SORROW _ #ANXIETY jackson purcell.png
 

#ANXIETY

In this selfie I just want to shine
The way that Demi Moore’s hair shines
It is the way that your future shines
In a whole ocean of likes
Or the way we shine driving
Through Laurel Canyon
To sketch our names in sand
In early Spring to count
Each syllable of the coastline
To take extra Xanax & go to Chipotle
To escape our collective anxiety

#NECK

In this selfie I’m the queen of being basic
Watching The Kentucky Derby in a hotel lobby
Talking to the bartender with an epic kind honesty
I say don’t you like my new hat
I say make mine a double with the tilt of my head
Make me a fresh tonic of ice, rosemary & gin
Make me aglow like the animals
Racing neck and neck

#SORROW

In this selfie I am a bleak garden
Full of holes I am a box of roses
From Trader Joe’s in ultra vintage
A leopard coat a private road
A portrait of your mediocrity the link
In your bio a Sears catalog model
The moss of your sorrow

Heather Sweeney Headshot.JPG

Heather Sweeney

Heather Sweeney, she/her, lives in San Diego where she writes, teaches, and does visual art. Her chapbooks include Just Let Me Have This (Selcouth Station Press) and Same Bitch, Different Era: The Real Housewives Poems (above/ground press). Her collections, Dear Marshall, Language is Our Only Wilderness (Spuyten Duyvil Press) and Call Me California (Finishing Line Press) are forthcoming this year.

Headshot: Heather Sweeney

Photo Credit: Jackson Purcell


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