diorama: crash test dummy builds mannequin her white picket fence

                i once ate a penny                                hoped it would                                          grow
puppet the life                  you build                                 hands make hands
but it’s really all in the fence        the face          the squareness of the perimeter         hedged neat
              if all you wanted                     was my mouthhole               you could have found
   a better puppet            white the picture                    manicured dream
american          even with the dog shit                           2.5 children           the veil of the sprinkler
driveway tongue oil slick free                 spacious enough for an SUV                                 sensibility
            at night the windows illumined                                      perfect glow of electric           
candlelight happy           afterglow      scent of cinnamon    pumpkin             wafting out

 

diorama: mannequin writes a love letter in the dark

an atomic cloud of milk curdle
sickness rises to your lips

so long since you had seen the said         if you can find me       
               it dawned
               upon you        
                                          my hands
                                          hold nothing the useless things
                                          the useless things

                                          so you burn      peep holes       drill with stem of your cigarette
                                          lightblind
                         shield                  your eyes            you won’t believe them          
                                                                                     the Outthere will be different
                                                                                     than it seems
                                                                                                                   it seems
                                                                         i would be
                                                                           pheromones pasted on            a screen
how long          have you been waiting                  for your spaceship       to leave behind           
                the mess of you

back to issue

Laurin DeChae is a MFA candidate for poetry at the University of New Orleans, where she acts as the associate editor for Bayou Magazine. Her work appears or is forthcoming in Harpur Palate, burntdistrict, Rust + Moth, Crack the Spine, and elsewhere.