NELLE 8 | 2025
Fear like pollen,
a sticky costume.
On my to-do list:
eat a mango but
I couldn’t manage it.
The stone center turned me off
with its bitter end.
I stare out the slit
in the window from my bed,
watch squirrels race the powerlines
past a swarm of swirling bees
leaving the neighborhood,
a single colony split in two,
expanding to survive.
Ahead of me: a stretch
opening between flat road
and mountain ranges,
snowy, white knuckles
clenching the sky.
Later I try to eat again,
crack a fat farm egg
to find a blood spot
in a butter-slicked pan
ruptured from shell,
the unlucky percent
depositing a busted past.
There’s no factory to check
these eggs, no bright light
shone to find the imperfections
within. Only surprise. I still
haven’t learned to stomach
the flimsy waking of spring,
the sun cutting through
my moods as I candle
my dark membrane of mind,
learn how to eye
the bloody egg
for what it is
then scramble it pink.