Wanda Phipps
aspiration
my friend from detroit
told me I was acting like a bitch
and all my life I’ve longed
to be a bitch—not such a
people pleaser—so maybe
I’ve evolved—a fall from grace
as transformation not damnation
we were on a canoe trip
and I was drowning—no, not drowning
but being enveloped by water
and spit out someplace completely
different—falling through
a door into a room I didn’t
recognize—it didn’t smell right
and all the colors were wrong
limerence
lilith and david & lisa—2 back-to-back
black & white films on love & madness—all the light & shadow
in asylums—limerence as addiction—honeymoon hope
reality altered—breaking the cord connecting you
to the hyperreal—break the cord to the portable
amusement park—banjo strumming the thin wild mercury
sound—I am here and there and you would be
my emmylou and my june—nothing compares
now my heart sings for no one
woke up one morning and it was gone
picture
my eyes close on my
most favorite image
after I’ve vowed to
let it go—but it stays
plugged-in—an after-
image seared to the
inside of the lid by
the sun—not exactly
accurate but close enough
it all seems close
enough to touch—
the ginger beard
the coral bead
the loose notes
floating in air
the hand and
the soul attached
could be egg-shaped
could be rectangular
or a spiral forever
curling inward or
outward—time to
change trains—get
on the right track
back to the familiar
back to the geometric
outline—the grid
pressed onto the lid
embedded in the soul’s
eye
Her
a chant on the film by Spike Jonze
intuitive HER
adaptive HER
helpful HER
omnipresent HER
effective HER
persuasive HER
perceptive HER
hilarious HER
wave HER
particle HER
particular HER
operating HER
system HER
systematic HER
operative HER
operatic HER
insistent HER
logical HER
compassionate HER
desperate HER
HER inside the hardware
HER inside the mainframe
HER inside the multiverse
HER inside your mind space
HER inside the ones and zeros
HER without the smartphone
HER without the cigarettes
HER without the grief
HER without separation
HER without the exes
around HER the skyline
around HER the ocean
around HER the electromagnetic field
around HER the transportation system
around HER the full philosophy
above HER the sound of birds
above HER the open view
above HER the infinite sweetness
Wanda Phipps is a writer, performer, and translator living in Brooklyn, New York. She is the author of nine books of poetry, including Mind Honey (Autonomedia, 2021), Field of Wanting: Poems of Desire (BlazeVOX, 2008), and Wake-Up Calls: 66 Morning Poems (Soft Skull Press, 2004). Her poetry has been translated into Ukrainian, Hungarian, Arabic, Galician, and Bangla. She has received awards from the New York Foundation for the Arts, the National Theater Translation Fund, and others. As a founding member of Yara Arts Group, she has collaborated on numerous theatrical productions presented in Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, Siberia, and at La MaMa, E.T.C. in New York City.