After Bathing, I Yearn for Smoke

Christel Thompson

After Nicole Cooley

I have to unwind myself first. Let each column of my neck peel
apart from the other. Let the mirror fog up. Let the water  

drain, slowly, through the not-quite-sealed-right bath plug.
And then I will ache, silly-stupid in my want  

to be seventeen and high for the first time again.
To have the thick taste of dirty bong smoke coat and  

crawl up the back of my throat, to have it pour from out my eyes.
To fall back upon the worn corduroy couch  

of someone’s middle-class version of a trap basement, and blink
until the strung-up fairy lights start dancing a slow mambo. Yearn:  

from the Old English giernan, a Germanic base meaning ‘eager’.
Yearn: meaning long, pine, desire.  

Like how I want to feel you curl around me like a cat,
how I want your teeth to click against mine when I moan
into your mouth. How I want to fall asleep in the blue fire of your hair. 

Yearn: meaning crave, to be athirst for.   

Like the way a child begs water in the middle of the night,
like the way I jerk awake, sweat-slick in the summertime, dreaming  

of ice and sugar and the sweet scent of blunt roaches. Of the way
a kiss feels when my lids are low and my lips are buzzing.

Christel Thompson is a recent graduate of the University of Illinois, with publications out in Pier:to Collective and giallo lit, with work forthcoming in žvorljotine. Outside of her literary endeavors, she is a portrait photographer and avid Neon Genesis Evangelion fan. You can find her work/contact at christel-thompson.com