Small
What a catchy meat
this is.
What a mighty shelf life
these deflated berries have.
Inside the small burial
mounds,
ash follows
circles for days.
——
Medium
Run a beach and then
just fall over
and you
will get a strawberry.
My heart,
the great stupid
blue whale.
Bruise is his shadow,
and Bruise has
never even been
in the ocean.
On the blood’s edge,
he builds castles in all
kinds of shades
of nail,
and he is in love
with his polluted
sense of dusk.
Bruise holds
a glimmer picked
up from the dirty
floor.
——
Large
Let your dark skin collect
the rain and whatever else
it pulls
down with it.
Let the weak fossil
work.
Let it work its way
into your squinting sugary
dates.
Let the pit feel
bruised by the skin
for once.
Let the marooned
popsicle
kiss run us
down.
Let me shower
cap your kneecap.
Let the cloud’s small
accent form
your movements.
Let me hear the traces
of heated lavender
dragging.
Let what’s left of
the whale song tear
apart your water.
Let what’s left collect
in the used bread
bag the dark skin
carries.
——
Carrie Lorig was raised mostly in Wisconsin and continues to be aged by Korean magnolia trees, record player crackles, and the month of July. She is a bike messenger, but is giving it up to start the MFA program at the University of Minnesota in the fall. She has been published by elimae, Pop Serial, decomP, Miracle Monocle, and Word Riot, among others.