We need a safe word
for these conversations—
stop
and I don’t want to talk about it
aren’t working. Maybe pineapple
or crocodile are sharp and bumpy enough
to keep us from stumbling, again,
down this well-traveled road.
On tv, a ponytailed gymnast leaps,
tumbles over my cold coffee,
wobbles, falls, gets up again
and flies, face lifted skyward.
Wherever you look, you’ll go, so,
I am eyeing the horizon
again. The passing cars,
the bus station and
post cards from Santa Fe,
where it’s sunny
310 days of the year.
New Mexico
has poets and painters
and views enough for all of them.
American alligators
stand in for crocodiles.
Pineapple provided by Georgia O’Keeffe.
What do I have here
in this sharp and bumpy life?
Crocodiles somersaulting past my ears.
My mouth, opened for pineapples—
bitter, bitter.

Jennifer Maloney writes poetry and fiction; find her work in The Rome Review, Synkroniciti Magazine, Litro Magazine and many other places. She is the author of the hybrid chapbook Evidence of Fire (Clare Songbirds Publishing, 2023) and the full-length hybrid work Don’t Let God Know You are Singing (Before Your Quiet Eyes Publishing, 2024). Jennifer is a parent, a partner, and a very lucky friend, and she is grateful, for all of it, every day.