Kerri Quinn ~ Two Poems

Middle

We’re sup­posed to be
tak­ing a break.
Again.
But we meet for dinner
and I take you back
to my sublet
push you down on the couch.
We’re sur­round­ed by photos
of peo­ple I don’t know.
Their smiles fake.
Forced.
We kiss
slow­ly, deeply.
You slip my dress off so quickly
I don’t real­ize I am naked.
Your lips on my breast, you moan.
And my heart begins to ache.
I wish my love for you
was like the seeds
of a dan­de­lion flower.
Blown into the air.

~

Five

After you died, I told peo­ple it took two years
for me to stop crying.
But that was a lie.
I cried for five.
At Facebook posts by friends
who had lost mothers
and fluffy dogs named Mr. Snuggles.
I cried when I read the paper.
When I left my apartment.
and returned at night.
At movie trail­ers of super­heroes fly­ing through the air.
On the sub­way plat­form as a man across the tracks
combed his mother’s thin hair.
He was as tall as a giant.
She was small and frag­ile like a doll.
The only time I didn’t cry was when I called your mother.
I lis­tened to her weep.

~

Kerri Quinn is a New York City based writer, pro­duc­er and director.