How Things Go

And like everyone else, I'll want to start a band



The Mirror

We sat a while in silence like two strangers, facing each other. I didn’t ask her what had happened or what she had seen, or believed she had seen, in the mirror.


Where?

Did she tell me before we were born, we were waiting in the dark? Like leaves hanging on a black tree?




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Image shows a close up of a baroque ceiling fresco, depicting figures of all different kinds in clouds with angels, dramatically posed and dynamic, positioned closely to one another. The background is pale blue, and gold molding with marble statues can be seen around the bottom of the image. The colors of the figures in movement are warm in contrast with the white and grey clouds.

Study a Cause

Its seclusion, its great swaths of stillness. Wakefulness in amber.


A grayscale photo of the full moon, partially shadowed. The moon sits closer to the upper left corner of the image, as if a banner or flag. Photo is by Nathan Anderson on Unsplash.

The Matter

What is the child / in the moonlight?


A vintage orange television sits on the counter of a pale yellow kitchen.

Comfort Nausea

I’m in the sunroom of my Minneapolis apartment when my mother tells me she’s been watching Heartstopper.


The front cover for the speculative poetry collection DEAD BOYS IN SPACE. It has a background like the night sky, dark blue and subtly dappled with white spots. The words DEAD BOYS in all-caps and in bright yellow text are near the top and IN SPACE in the same format is near the bottom. Next to IN SPACE is the author’s name, Sara Youngblood Gregory, not in all-caps and a slightly smaller font but still yellow. In the center of the cover are two, red and very muscley men positioned around a red moon or planet. The men near the top left of the moon points downwards towards the moon/planet, and the man in the lower right has his right leg extended and his left hand poised with his fingers touching his forehead.

Excerpt from DEAD BOYS IN SPACE

alone but for each other, these exiles put a stopper on one of the most aggressive illnesses in the history of mankind


Quest for the Slappy Man-Hug

I’m starting to know these guys—so now, when they see me, this parade of tatted-up, newly sober straight men come at me with the Slappy Man-Hug.