Two Poems by Nora Rose Tomas
THE BODY PROBLEM
the soft animal of my body is rotating in the
7/11 hot dog display
I never loved this thing
oh this body
problem
you can not optimize
your mother
you can get chlamydia
in your heart
I never cared for Mary Oliver, childhood,
warm bread
I never wanted
to be a miserable person
but here I am
holding
the long neck
of this
dead bird
DISASTER AND ME
disaster and me
which has been cruel to my shallow body
there is a way that I am more a lake
than a woman
I’ve always imagined lakes to be restless
a quality I prescribe onto all things
forced into stillness
where would lakes go
if they could
where would I go if I were
a woman
I imagine myself gathering up
my shores like a skirt, trudging
through the city
my waterness in a way
a catastrophe
a woman
looking to drown
Nora Rose Tomas is a queer writer based in Brooklyn. She received her MFA from Columbia University. You can find her at norarosetomas.com.
