poems: Stevie Edwards

Notes for a Cosmopolitan Woman



There are loves who will kiss your thighs
and not wince at the decade-old haunts
of stretch marks. Remember your father
examining the faint red lines, devil’s fingernails
on a chalkboard of pale skin, the sting
of ocean, a new bathing suit you’d saved
lunch money to buy. Find a man
who smokes too much and curses without
emotion. Let him make your ribcage
his wind chime. Let him hang you
from the bedpost, rattle you—
open the window, pray for wind,
for anything but the summer sap stick
of air binding your bones to flesh
to bedsheets. Quit eating meat, don’t renew
your food-stamps, eat only bread
until you find the visage of a virgin
on your dry rye toast. Remember the ache
of want in your father’s voice the last time
he reminded you your mother was barely
a hundred pounds when they married.
Find a photo of yourself the last time
you were a hundred pounds—
the shipwreck eyes of an expired passport
staring out at what could become a double
chin. Praise the braveness of collarbone,
how ready your cheekbones look to leave.
Middle school health videos warned you’d lose
your period if not fed. At the homecoming game
wearing khakis you were disgusted to find
womanhood. There’s nothing holy about
blood. Disregard your doctor’s warnings.
Something is always going to kill you.
Your breasts will burn off last.

Maybe, God

Maybe the man on the train
who reeks of whiskey is drowning
in God’s piss and thirsts
for anything else. Maybe he lost
all his kind words in an alley
fight. Maybe the only words
he’s got left are, Fuck you!
Maybe he can’t decipher lips
asking, Are you okay? Maybe
his darkness is too thick
to see how easily the moon
punctures this milky galaxy
of skyscrapers. Maybe
the man who nearly
raped my passed-the-fuck-out
body last night stopped
because something hanging
in the chill air reminded him
of how holy we both could be.
Maybe he stopped because
I smelled of whiskey
and wasn’t what he thirsted.
Maybe he couldn’t bear
the luminance of my bare skin.
Maybe the golden ring around
the moon suggests God
was wasted and got carried away
taking a piss. Maybe God
heard the moon gets off
on golden showers. Maybe
God heard the moon thirsts
for him. Maybe God saw
her light and mistook it for fire.

STEVIE EDWARDS spent her formative years in Michigan and now lives and works in Chicago. She is the Editor in Chief/Founder of MUZZLE Magazine, and she has poems published in several literary magazines, including PANK, Word Riot, and Monkeybicycle. She is a part of the Real Talk writing collective in Chicago, and she regularly attends the Vox Ferus After Dark workshop series.