Brick

Brick Emily Wong

Between the drinks and the cigarettes— the smell of vine-ripened tomatoes; the sound of the cicadas. Slung moons slow ocean: Switching addictions is tricky.

I am bones walking down a runway. I am the shape of shadows. Of dying light.

Sleep inside my lungs; breathe into someday. Someday meaning never, never meaning: That heart-stopping moment; the pin-prick through your left lobe.

I brought a mood ring, a broken windshield, and literature… smelling of death.

I love the space between the pauses: a quiet cliché, a blackened heart.

That tire screech, metal crunch. That perfect, plastic, better dream; my cracked scapula whispers: Going home is easy— it’s the arriving that sticks in the throat.