Colleen O'Brien

5 poems
from Reel

A Poem for Your Walk This Morning


With the rabbit
in the backyard headlights last night
something long-tailed

muskrat possum

someone
would know; I don’t,
said Larkin & my love & I now
say it often.

With the poet
in the background things take
untrustworthy

singularity radiance

no one
would see; I don’t
if put near other
people often.

What’s it for
then? Solitary
non confinement

 

Envy


woke denying
the dream

didn’t count
your blessings, bitch,

one Ur text
message none

would call a [find a
foreign word]

besides you
love her

bedside you
aren’t that

[leave this blank] not

even for a second

honeymoon
suite ladies

be gentle
men my

ego’s in your hands

 

Habilitate


I didn’t mean to be at this party

first I was alone a public place

I had all these old dresses and was trying to find one
he hadn’t seen

the party grew larger

it was after all a party not just people

a high number now there must
be preferences

I was excited though to be at a party

I would tell my friends oh yeah I
was just at this party

I tried to find a dress that wouldn’t hurt his feelings

this one my dad bought me when I was twenty

I was paranoid the lady at the store
thought we were dating

I envy now what then I

stop that it’s wrong

it can help though
at this kind of party

I had this new dress but he had seen it

I had all these problems with my hands
and feet the doctor said I should

be ashamed

I gathered my things and moved away
from preferences

I kept looking over at them

I chose a dress he’d know I wasn’t wearing

for that reason

 

Michael Finnegan

re
begin

afoul
of all

intimacy

*

forgave all debts,
grand gestures, etc.

*

from here there shall can

only more no less

*

i was sober six years and six months and

*

bursting can spits

like in the
ad mists

her screen-lit face she

wipes her chin

*

re be
gin your ún

intén

did what
’s the french for

cry for

*

write sober edit sober makes john
imagine decomposing women in
the steam

goddamn, girlflesh
stay on!


*

the choice does seem lose one
or other mind

or matter

*

begin can
re can

know an old man named

poor

 

Coming Down


Aphorisms on stone benches
Neon in a gallery

Who was that was that

gone in long

return

thick with fantasy

a concentrated color rivuleting into water
filamenting

into water

what if we took no photos

eye contact with a child is like

what if we made no videos what

if the

were the art

the fingerprint what if

I were as neon sober as
aphoristic sober as what

not to be

small but larger

plastic pearls on a woman’s dress if you remembered
plastic pearls on a woman’s dress

Aphorisms in new asphalt
Neon against collision

who was

Colleen O'Brien's poetry and short fiction have appeared in The Gettysburg Review, Antioch Review, Fence, Kenyon Review Online, and other journals. Her debut story collection, All Roads, was published by TriQuarterly Books in 2022. She is also the author of a chapbook, Spool in the Maze, from DIAGRAM/New Michigan Press.