maddie barone / poem

Towards the Other

The rinds glistening always on our pillow, 

our necks bent towards the other, 

our hands fold into the edges of tired space. 

The air is ripe and at the beginning of bursting –

you put your hands on my face, cover my nose,

my eyes, lick the sweat off the corner of my 

brow. There is dancing and then there is this:

the slow pull of night, your unsocked feet 

pulsing the wooden floors, cold and racing 

to find the corner of some forgotten blanket, 

hair swaying against your forehead,

your glasses folded carefully on the bedside table. 

The kitchen dark as you pour enough water 

to fill our cups.

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Maddie C. Barone is a queer writer from the South. They received their MFA from the University of South Carolina. Their work has appeared in Quarterly West, The Penn Review, The Madison Review, and elsewhere. They have a cat called Goose.