Three Poems by Zoe Contros Kearl

YOU LIKE YOUR COFFEE LIGHT AND SWEET

you said that you have a lot of
“spooky feelings”

the words bounced off my teeth

 

ORDERING GLENFIDDICH IN TEXAS

light another Marlboro
Japanese alt rock droning

forgetting the curvature of your lips
the sound of 
your drunk Russian accent

it was a pretty thing

 

“ARE YOU HAPPY?”

I paused too long because
happy is a relative term

a forty of cheap beer
and a smoke filled living room

your coat under my arm
hanging on the chair
temporal because
it belongs to you

on the way home
a girl stood alone on the train platform
in a black cocktail dress
holding a bouquet of orchids

 

Zoe Contros Kearl is a Texan poet living in New York who loves the smell of Mrs. Meyer's Clean Day liquid dish soap.