E.G. Cunningham's poems have appeared in Thread, The MAG, The California Quarterly and elsewhere. A recent graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop, she currently lives in Iowa City.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Thread the Ground

Either this or I call Canada. Oh my it's daylight
what's your daylight opinion on my sending
anything that comes before I've put stamps on
I love you like personals ads and personal stars
swf seeking sws...single wish star. My head is
blurry from essay land, xo from the snow. I wash
my hands in front of a mirror and see my scarf and
all I can think about is tying your wrists.
To take the risk in hope of a favorable outcome.
I've got to have a moment every now and then.
I remember the morning after with
eggs and brandy, cemetery, the when is the illegibility,
your hands so pale on the couch seat, restless.
We talked, you're leaving the country,
it's the end of the year and we've laid time down,
we'd had no New Zealand, no rallies, it wasn't
a great season, but it was better than most, mostly.
Dismal, I'm seeing faces you've pressed against,
again. This is what happens to the alchemist -- I
bounced in your living room while you watched from the
kitchen, you yawned with foreigners in the next room
while I made love. Made maybe. We've gone through
the piles, now the good episodes. My banjo.
My golden horse. You my airship, my second war, one more
and then covers down, cold open window.
We were the different note, middle C lighter.
We never cooked, we interchanged, your hands
still the softest things, because of words. I cleave only
to things that are leaving. I re-remember. Hundreds
of dollars later, there's the desk, the bed, bishop, the
erasure, you called me seashell, little mountain, you
call me now from miles
and I could hold on for hours. I do.