Poetry by Ronnie K. Stephens
DEAR DARKNESS
after Rachel McKibbens
You have been the bitter pill at the back of my throat, the hungry shadow that consumes the light. And by light of course I mean the trees. The perennials. The fiddle leaf fig and the monstera and the bird of paradise. And yes the one who sat with me in a carpeted field full of knives. That girl who begged me to sleep on her couch and sit beside her at the pool and share a bowl of macaroni and cheese—the only thing she knew how to make—because she could see you knocking at the back of my empty rooms and hollow cupboard. You feed on what might otherwise bloom like a frost. But when you sleep the sleep that lingers, I confess I miss most the way you shade. I am not built for brightness. It burns and it squeals and it skips when all I want is to walk quiet and alone in the simmer dim. I find you there, where the sun sinks low, where the blue sky blackens and heavies my chest, where I dream of blooming on the vine, skin purpling like crocuses in spring. You bitter. You shadow. You most faithful, most constant unbecoming. I miss myself when I find you. No. I miss you when I find myself.
GOLDEN STATE
My partner & I load baggage into the car
& map our route to Mineral Wells,
a rare weekend without the kids or dog.
Predictably, the first argument begins
while we map our route to Mineral Wells.
We don’t know how to be alone anymore
on the weekends. Without the kids or dog
exhaustion weaponizes itself & we fire.
Anymore we don’t know how to be alone
with each other, air our frustrations sharp.
Exhaustion weaponizes itself & we fire
off all the wrongs we have chambered.
With each other, our sharp frustrations aired
the last hour of the drive is a weighted blanket
of all the wrongs we have unchambered.
At the hotel, they send me out for snacks.
I leave the weighted blanket of our last hour
on the side of the road. Return to find them
at the hotel, hungry for the snacks I’ve brought.
They are showered & naked beneath the duvet.
I return from the road to find them lying
in the bed. We kiss hard & fuck there
beneath the duvet, showered & naked,
then bathe together & watch television
in the bed where we fuck & kiss hard again.
They’ve caught the Golden State Killer, I hear.
We bathe together & watch the television.
Mid morning, we load our baggage into the car.
Ronnie K. Stephens holds a Bachelor of Arts in Classical Studies, a Master of Arts in Creative Writing, a Master of Fine Arts in Fiction, and a PhD in English. His research centers the role of poetry in subverting anti-ethnic and anti-LGBTQ legislation affecting public education. He is the author of Universe in the Key of Matryoshka, They Rewrote Themselves Legendary, The Kaleidoscope Sisters, and Transgressive Poetics in the Twenty-First Classroom.
Arcturus 