Magi Sumpter
(I Want) To Be Everything,
minus a man:
to feel the beach hug on my broad shoulders, never quite
dipping my toes in the ashy sand.
to fix my squealing brakes in a bralette.
to be the box my cats lay in and call home,
scratched up by ten minutes of biscuits.
to write a poem about the beauty of woman,
minus the misogynized tiptoe around how many
handfuls equal a good tit.
to explain, in vivid detail, how each roll
on her renaissance stomach feels
like a sip of southern sweet tea between my fingers.
how her mind leaves mine wrapped in knots
of silk, slips of genius.
to become a woman in a space i’ve never felt so female,
so my mother’s child,
wading in hair clippings on the bathroom floor.
to pick through dead things with brow tweezers
to scrapbook all i find.
Upon the Rocks
I await the day I straddle the solar system in Doc Martens and men’s Levi’s—
Left pinky toe tucks a stray hair behind Pluto’s ear,
kisses her forehead,
says “I love you”
with aloe vera socks, scuffed soles;
other foot squishes Sun’s face,
makes him lick its boots,
spits in his eye,
feels him up on asphalt like a fucked
cigarette.
Atoms flee Sun like sparks—
|diffuse into Eves
guiding sailors home with sultry siren songs:
destined, they are, to hang off the
edge,
be driven mad upon the rocks
by girls and theys in crop tops and men’s Levi’s,
beautiful to taunt, too smart to fall.
The men hear “love” in gurgled water breath.
The sirens flick their eyes to me;
Venus holds me aloft.
Hawaiian shirt flaps in a zero-g breeze,
eyes slice softly at Saturn’s rings
where Sappho softly naps,
bloodied, waterlogged screams her lullaby.
I watch from my heavenly body
as those fated fall prey over and over again.
(previously published by All Guts No Glory)
Magi Sumpter is an agent of chaos with a Goodreads account. They spend most of their off days reading sad queer fantasy or indulging their cats’ eclectic music taste. She is the author of two chapbooks. LITTLE ROOMS WITH BAD LIGHTING, is available for free digital download with Ghost City Press and Utopia in Green is available for pre-order through kith books
