On the Side of the Road

yesterday, on the car ride home,

I had to pull over and

imagine you

slipping your slight fingers

under my shirt and over my fluttering heart-

—

I let my eyes roll inwards

and back

to that blinking

jungle of cobweb confusion

that blossoms

in your body

between sleep and sight.

Where everything flashes

then falls

loose

and limp.

“I had to” by Angie Hoover-Hillhouse

Artwork: Wildwood by Elle Hanley

On Your Merry-go-round

I see that it is me

I am running after.

soft, bowed legs

flat, smacking feet

and a lung inflated by the the pinching mist

of your marigold perfume.

I live in

circles within circles in a Nowhereland–

but

as long as the haze of your touch

tingles

in my chest,

I am happy to spin

like a carousel horse

with a pole

through

its

spine.

“Spun” by Angie Hoover-Hillhouse

Artwork: A Delicate Balance by Morgan Kendall

Plump Plumb

when curls unfold

limber fingers embrace salty hair

bound by the sea

through the earth

above the air

heaving hearts thrust blood out and around

as lips

once loose with language

slowly suck

breathes large and small

to fill plump plumb colored lungs

which swell

which fall

“Plump Plumb” by Meaghan Merrifield

An Actor and Love

Perhaps an actor should expect to fall in love.

Because, in a sense, it is part of the job description.

In a way, an actor could say,

“I audition, I network, I memorize lines, and I fall in love.”

We sat down, across from each other – the lights almost blinding. But within them, my eyes found one thing and comfortably focused on another pair of eyes, which blinked me into focus as I did him. They were brown eyes. When our eyes had adjusted, and all we could see was each other, there was something we then had to deal with, which neither of us had foreseen.

“I love you.”

When an actor says it, they have to mean it.

They have to feel it, or you can tell.

You watch a movie and you think,

“This fucking sucks.”

There’s no time for it.

Art that does not come from some manner of truth

Is self-indulgent without being rewarding.

(I don’t want to forget this feeling. When time stopped and all there was… was he and I. In real life he is married and I am living with my boyfriend, and this man and I know nothing about each other.

But an actor’s life is blurred with fantasy, blessed with passion, and cursed with un-satisfiable desire.

I knew that in this room, under these lights, this time set aside for us to act, I knew that I was safe and I was free to experience him. I these

eternal/too-brief

moments, I lamented and he lamented that he married too soon. A mistake had been made, because there was a magic here, a knowledge that came from somewhere else. And desire.)

DESIRE.

I allowed myself to enjoy it for a few hours.

But

All

Love,

And

All

Things,

I know it is fleeting.

“An Actor and Love” by Vanessa Cate

Artwork: Drugi by Vesna Pesic