We chase:

these legs were made for running
away from here, not to who
my heart was never taught to sit
but oh the short 800 mile sprint to you

maybe one day, I’ll find you in pace
and you won’t be the one who got away
oh the things runners do to their bodies
for the chance the high will stay

how cruelly fleeting people can be
so that the chase was born
you are not mine
if you are a rose, that is the thorn

the chase tires us out to such a degree
there is no word search in your poetry
with this game there is no guarantee
moving targets: you and me

oh grand, uncertain chase
past lives still in withdrawal
the romantic and me
a fool for it all

____________________________________________
Women and their vices:

krissy sits beside me on the dock

her berry lips kiss her cigarette
her fingers are slim and delicate
her red nails are slightly chipped
she doesn’t know if she wants to be a poet or in love

she comes back to me with her exhale
“women like us” and “guys in their 20s” crash on the rocks of our quiet
she discovered she is beautiful last weekend
I catch her in the bright of the moon and it’s echo on the lake

She was jealous of me once she says
But not because of me or her, but because of him

krissy takes another drag
Her fingers are so pretty
I watch them cradle that dirty cigarette



Eliza Joy, poetry