Alter, Edit, or Move

He wants us to hug strangers.
I don’t hug anything.
I hear the omnipotent voice.
He tells us to go toward the center.
We hold our arms out,
dance to the field
exhilarated and communal.

We begin to stretch and the music changes.
We take out our umbrellas.
I am unsure how many of us are participating in this experiment.

He wants us to hug inanimate objects.
We get stuck on the word inanimate,
wonder if trees count.

He’s trying to relax us.
He wants our excitement contained.
We make sure that no one has stumbled or vomited.

He tells us it’s a disguise that won’t hurt anyone.
I give a high five to no one,
thumb war with no one.
We all stand up – except that so many of us are already standing.

A sudden change
I look
it seems as
if we’re all

don’t think

at this point



He wants to know where I live.



He praises our

We’re supposed to
begin to breathe



We make our way there with our fingers


pose. Touch your nose he says.




people are going to look at us funny.


He obviously doesn’t realize



where everyone else

suddenly forced forward as poetry

poetry as an eruption. how it comes up like yesterday’s vodka. no sleep tonight, or not yet. puke it into a toilet. pressed cheek against a sewage seat that hasn’t been cleaned for at least a month. curious how it can be so vile. erupts like a tupperware party ulcer. a long narrow band of sarcasm and unhappy women who couldn’t possibly care about plastic boxes when they could be kissing on each other. erupts like water and mucus shoots out the orifice of a whale. or hairballs on the rug. wait till it dries, it’ll be easier to pick up. eruption as a forced exit of something soft from something hard. really hot or really gross. erupts from a pore in earth. or a nostril. erupts because it does. as it is.

a response

monday (k)night butch

of course i noticed
how your sentences mirror mine
"you've reached melissa kozakiewicz/
please leave a message"
as if you read it
all ready
said it to me as if
you meant it as if
your terror might be
invisible inside parentheses as if
our names aren't hidden
couched inbetween letters
not obvious but not
secret or at least
not to me

but i know you

Red Giant Phase: A Collaboration

for elizabeth

his toes reach almost the wind or else they direct the eye toward the woman he loves. she wears green when she feels radiant and wants him to know. his tag is exposed but he doesn’t concern himself with matters like shirts or money or trauma or death when she is the distance of one arm out. their toes mingle, tingle into after noon, flirt with the sand because he is in the most shocking love that one can find on a beach. later he uses a stick to carve her initials in the sand and she sends out light because she has waited for him for 4.57 billion years. this kind of far away love that directs climate even when naysayers think it won’t. this kind of love that supports almost all life below the toes and electrifies the body in a way that seems dangerous to the weak. to the smarmy. she tosses her hair and flares when he insists on capturing the picture but he does it anyway. he sets it as background on her phone to prioritize the moment. to discover that as long as their feet are touching then nothing else matters. and she glimmers because that’s what she does around him.

photo: Bob Nardi
text: mel kozakiewicz

better a butch than a man

she and me
we drunk stumble to the rental room.
i pass out dizzy one foot anchor the floor.
she mounts me and grinds,
dirty t-shirt uncovered thighs.
butch emulating a masculinity better left behind.
how often women wake with squirm on limp bodies.
better a butch than a man. no
poke poke puuussssshhh.
familiar fluids flip with women.
on top and inside.
disgust disguised
smirking fiesty.
HORNY because she came
WHILE I SLEPT so
she don't need a wake pussy.