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Jocelyn Mosman


Organic Musings

You say I am really cheesy, 
and I ask you, 
what kind? 
Am I holy like Swiss, 
or sharp-witted like Cheddar, 
or do I grate on your nerves
like Mozzarella? 

You cringe.
I laugh. 

I say you are fruitful, 
and you ask me, 
what kind? 
Are you fresh like a strawberry, 
or sour like a lemon, 
or tart like a blueberry? 

We both laugh, 
and cringe. 

You are a blueberry, I say. 
and I picked you. 

Your eyes match the night sky, 
just as it reaches dusk, 
if I were an artist 
I would paint your eyes
and the sky 
with blueberries. 
But you know I’m not. 

Instead, I write poems, 
and you decide 
I am a little more
Mozzarella than Swiss. 

We both fall asleep, 
laughing. 
​

Eulogy for a Muffin

It was a good muffin, 
the way it crumbled gently
as it touched my moist lips. 
It knew no other mouth but mine.
It was made with care 
and dedication and love,
baked from some kitchen. 
I don't know who baked it, 
but I like to pretend it was
a big burly man with a beard. 
Something about this muffin,
it tasted like strength, 
had the consistency 
of my father's belt, 
and taught me patience 
as it melted on my tongue. 
A beautiful muffin! 
Its aroma filled the entire room,
smelling of sweet pumpkin 
and spice and all things 
naughty and nice. 
It reminded me of Christmas-
the one we had at my Grandma's 
in Pennsylvania 
after Grandpa died. 
It was sweet, 
but had just a hint of salt. 
I can't be sure if the baker 
cried when mixing ingredients, 
if he, too, had felt loss. 
This muffin left its remains sticky 
on my fingers 
like ashes, 
like play dough, 
like muffin dough 
if muffins are made 
using dough. 
(I'm not sure, I don't cook.)
I wanted to know 
the man behind this muffin, 
the great bearded one. 
I wanted to meet the two cats, 
calico and black, 
that crawled up onto the counter,
blocking the view of 
the recipe, 
and made this man create 
this muffin 
literally by scratch. 
I wanted to know this muffin man,
the one who lives on Drury Lane. 
He created a muffin so insatiable,
metaphors won't do it justice. 
A muffin like that would win 
poetry slams 
because it was so poetic
when devoured, 
and the empty plate,
licked clean by two cats, 
calico and black, 
looked more like a broken heart
than a well-loved dish. 
The plate and me,
me and the plate, 
we tasted the tears
of the man behind this muffin. 
We both knew tonight, 
there would be 
no more 
inspirational muffins
to kiss us goodnight.
​

How to Love a Fat Girl

She's beautiful,
and everything I never could have imagined. 

She’s 23 and drinking whiskey 
before bedtime. 
She said her dreams tasted better
when she drank. 

Her hair was dyed a shade of red
and brown and black
because rainbows are for 
promises, she said. 
"God wouldn't lie."

She was 200 pounds 
and curvy. 

Her waistline was not large enough
to hold her heart,
but it was too large 
to fit in a rectangular mirror. 

She did not care about fitting
into mirrors or boxes or bra sizes. 

She said it felt better when she 
left her clothes in the drawers
and just walked around
feeling her skin connect with nature.

When I wanted to have sex with her,
she asked me, "Screw or make love?
There is a difference."

She did not turn off the light
to get undressed. 

She's the most beautiful woman
I have ever witnessed.

Tattoos were strewn across her body
like the Sistine Chapel.
I'd never seen art look so holy.

She took my hand and placed it
just above her heart. 
She told me that it beat a little faster
because she might be slightly
out of shape. 

But how can a woman so strong
be out of shape? 
I told her that I loved her shape.
She laughed. 

"Nobody loves a fat girl," she said.
"Women like us are supposed to
fall in love with people like you."
She said. "We are supposed to fall,
and we are supposed to stay down." 

She's the most beautiful woman
I have ever met and yet she swore
that I did not love her. 

She swore that
I did not see her face turn pale
when she stepped onto a scale
or in front of a mirror.

And that
I did not see her hold a knife 
and a bottle of pills like a
lifeline gone wrong. 

I told her that I know 
I did not see her pain and 
I did not see her past.
I just saw a beautiful woman. 

I told her
that's all I needed to see
to know how to love her.

Rewind

Time turns backwards
every second I'm with you.
Seconds with you
feel like an eternity.
I'll reflect the sunlight in
your arms
and the moonlight
from my bare chest.
We use dials
to tell the hour,
and flowers will blossom
in winter and winter will
be spring,
and my springs will recoil
to spend negative time with you.
I wish I could remember tomorrow,
but yesterday is the only
day we have left
until we rewind again.
My biological clock
is an alarm
and I have your child
and get pregnant and fall
in love all over again.
The cuckoo cries.
The last hour we are together,
and the world starts spinning
in reverse.
I want to be with you until
the Big Bang happens.
We will turn to darkness
instead of light.

​
Picture

Jocelyn Mosman's profile

Neurosis

I am dark matter, white noise.
I can’t fall asleep
in midnight’s unrelenting
stillness.
 
The quiet makes
everyone and everything outside
disappear and
I feel alone.
 
I don’t know how to be alone
without losing my self.
Anxiety sets in
like mist.
 
I evade shadows,
lose focus as the sun
rises and
sets.
 
Some days,
I can’t keep up.
I need to breathe
but I can’t.
 
I am trapped
on this blue planet,
silently spinning
through space.
 
The world I was born into was
a muted scream made audible
in the emergency exit
of my mother’s belly.
 
I have made 20 revolutions
around a sun
I cannot control,
            a cycling of
 
waves, planets, bicycles, periods,
This noisy rhythm is dull
against my
heartbeat. 
 
The compression of blood
in and out of ventricles
in and out of veins,
            out of me:
 
like the ocean
washing the beach
after footprints litter
its pristine shoreline;
 
like the final squeeze
of catsup before it reaches
its sputtering and anticlimactic
finish;
 
like you
sighing, begging me
to stop being
so neurotic.
 
Each year, a twister
that sweeps me off my feet
day after day,  but I always find
my way home.
 
I don’t know where home is,
not anymore,
but being here with you
seems right.
 
The snow is silent as dots
falling from the darkness
of the heavens
onto spindly trees
 
The world is quiet here,
except the wind
on the window pane,
            and you beside me.
 
You hold my hand,
our body heat colliding
in the darkness and
            I can’t let go.

Fragile Woman

Our slit wrists are 
severe weather alerts, 
and we are sounding out 
unnatural disasters. 
We bleed until our palms 
are clasped together
dripping our prayers 
onto cracked canvases. 
We keep
our hearts like angel wings, 
growing a feather with every 
heartbreak, 
and I know women 
who are flying right now.
They bleed out too many 
days without sunrises
keep tally marks 
on their flesh, 
wait for their chance
to breathe again
without having to bite their tongues, 
and swallow 
bloody saliva 
that tastes like their unspoken self-defenses. 
I know women whose DNA
turned against them, 
created a pallet of brown
and grey and emptiness, 
never satisfied with their 
shade of pretty.
I know women whose
hearts are breaking
without the metaphor. 
They are pleading
without any god
for a new one before 
theirs erupted in the ER…  
2015 has a way of breaking 
women's hearts, 
and teenage girls are bleeding out
broken futures. 
I know women who are performing
exorcisms on their spirits, 
hoping that their unholy ghost
paints their wings white
with every slice of the knife. 
Fragile women, 
bodies made beautiful, 
and self-destructive. 
We aren’t meant to bleed
like martyrs. 
Don't cast down your faces, 
look into the places
of your body 
you've never seen. 
Every hair is a part of your halo, 
every scar is a rose petal
for you to garden 
with self-love. 
Fragile women, 
we are born to be strong, 
ashes being relit 
into the fire 
we started from. 
Let our bruises become candles
guiding our angels with broken wings
and misplaced spirits
home. 

I Need

a shoulder
with body attached;
 
a heart
to beat in sync with mine;
 
the spirituality of skin;
 
joy
in flesh and bone
and all ten thousand emotions;
 
pain
that brings consciousness;
 
that ridiculous smile;
 
your grandiose chuckle;
 
chocolate or your eyes
or both;
 
a new wrist
unscarred and unscathed;
 
a new throat
to speak stolen words;
 
a new spine
to support yours
like a double helix;
 
a new hand
and fingers and strength;
 
guidance
like a compass pointing truth;
 
wisdom
like a night owl asking “who?”;
 
a life vest;
 
a titanic heart
when I'm drowning
and there is no land in sight;
 
a lighthouse calling me home;
 
sand between my fingers
like time spilling out;
 
the wrinkled shoreline of neck;
 
to be able to say
all the words caught in
my fishnet of a throat:
 
i love you,
 
goodbye



​
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