Hanna Pachman
Invisible Spiders
Online dating is a burgundy cave,
full of old dicks and new age pigs ready to
spread their bones like ghosts.
It took me a while to learn how
to live with brain fog.
My smile starts with shaking skeletons,
before I press on the breaks like a mad man.
I state that I’m taking Covid-19 seriously in my bio.
Smaller spiders can survive higher falls.
People are drunkenly cascading the streets
on the weekend nights, like Vegas.
My sound collapses onto your furrowed expression,
as you try to figure out what kind of alien I am.
It has been exactly two days since
I have stalked my ex-boyfriend’s new girlfriend.
Wolves dancing in Egypt force
their way into my brain, as I try to talk to you
about my lack of confidence.
Politely, I ask an avatar
every place he has been
in the last 6 months.
Spiders have excellent eye-sight,
they use their webs to think.
Wanting more leaps of departed hahas,
I tickle you with nervousness
expanding at the great wall of solitude.
The sinking starts at my chest
and lingers like a fly circling chocolate cake
as I take another bite of trying to hear you.
I spy group photos taken as recently as
during the global pandemic.
A spasm through my back reminds me
it has been enough time smiling today.
Chronic pain is hard to see through,
like a past lover’s imprint
bleeding on your forehead.
Dating apps are a reminder that the world
doesn’t understand invisible illnesses.
No echoes against my stomach,
pressing beside the pure agony of
burning bricks, rocking me
back and forth on the ground.
I hope my vibrator doesn’t
keep me up too late tonight.
—Submitted on 10/06/2020
Hanna Pachman‘s poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Linden Avenue Literary Journal, Anti-Heroin Chic, Fourth & Sycamore, Oddball Magazine, and Aberration Labyrinth. Originally from Connecticut, she lives in Los Angeles, where she hosts a monthly poetry event, “Beatnik Cafe,” and is an assistant editor for the poetry magazine, Gyroscope Review.
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