These two poems by Robin Sinclair plumb the depths of our longing for connection (to each other and to ourselves), reminding us that we construct our present from stories we tell about our past, “a tin can/ echoing thin across/ a thousand/ miles.”
by: Robin Sinclair
Ode To Molly
Oak brown locks swoop in
half-circles, belling at the bottom
unremarkable rays from a small star
on the back of her crown.
Her flat face rises, smiling at
lines in a best-seller on her phone.
Her flat shoe dangles off
a pallid foot, ashy, vascular, hard-heeled.
Her flat skirt tucked under
her leg, taupe jacket bottom-zipped
on the B train in summer.
Take The Back Roads To Her
Along a string
her voice
vibrated
Scolded
you through
a tin can
echoing thin across
a thousand
miles
Just
a forty
minute midnight drive
to the town
where you’d
met
Coffee
and breath
steam the windshield
Across the glass
the wipers
ache
cracked
driver’s side
window dripping water
letting out the
smoke and
sound
Songs
from your
youth with her
Fingers flicking ashes
to the
floor.
Robin Sinclair is a gender-queer writer of mixed heritage and mixed emotions, currently living in New York City. Robin’s work has been published in various magazines and journals, including Gatewood Journal, Cahaba River Literary Journal, Black Heart Magazine, Red Bird Chapbooks, Opening Line Literary Magazine, and Freaks N Geeks Magazine.
