forty-five by jessica lovett

people running around
like bucketless leaks,
storm air suffocating them
with their own hands
and if something breaks—
if something breaks—
i’ll just fix it like i do,
like mighty people do,
patch the holes in your face
where the bees ate

and dad says forty-five is when you get sad,
when you see famous people on the
train and their shoe’s untied,
and you whisper all sorts of poems
to yourself
under the blare buzz beat of crickets,
cracking shells with your teeth,
swallow the egg,
mystery of the pretty girl
stuck in your head

and everything sounds like a book that you could write—
that’s what you always said