With You Gone

I eat grapes in threes, pierce them all at once,
wrap your hair around my finger, call it a ring.
I dance with your shadow, arms out,
middle-school-like, in a shameful kind of way.
I pour ice into the bath, each cube exploding into water
one by one, foam gushing past my legs like a horserace.
I sit and let the whole tub drain,
put my hand against the fine holes,
let it tug the skin.

 

Kara Goughnour is a queer writer living in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. They are the author of “Mixed Tapes,” forthcoming through Ghost City Press. They are the recipient of the 2018 Gerald Stern Poetry Award, and have work published or forthcoming in The Bitchin’ Kitsch, Third Point Press, and over thirty-five others. Follow them on Twitter @kara_goughnour or read their collected and exclusive works at karagoughnour.com.