by Emily Hansen
If I have a home it’s a metaphor
a simple house near
a beige ocean the gulfpacificatlantic
melded until they’ve lost
their spark the way a rainbow
of crayons might melt together
in a microwave and become
uncolor in this house
I’m told one thing
downstairs and another
upstairs coffee drips
from the old white pot I am waiting
on the stairs for Santa my mother
calls from her bed there won’t
be much this year my father
writes from a ship whispers
from the garage over
a chorus of waves a lie
things always get better
at the dining table
we sit over bowls
of scrabble tiles crunch
them between our teeth
make conversation I spell
E M I L Y
no proper nouns they coo
there’s no reception from the living
room and from the yard
the house is only
ember dying fire
begging come back inside
I am the author of Home and Other Duty Stations (Kelsay Books) and the chapbook The Way the Body Had to Travel (dancing girl press). My poetry has appeared in 32 Poems, Hobart, Up the Staircase Quarterly, Atticus Review, Glass: A Journal of Poetry, and The Shore among others. I live in Atlanta where I am a PhD student at Georgia State University and an instructor of English at Agnes Scott College.