Talking on the Phone Isn't Good Enough

I haven’t been scandalized in months.
I wish I could see your face
when I tell you a very good secret.
I wish I could smell your fake tan
getting dressed in a locker room.
I want to show up at your house
unannounced and make your brother
let me in. I want to buy you
a sushi dinner and have a good cry.
How better to remember the ferocity
of our love than by breaking something
together (say, a brown glass bottle
on the bathroom floor)? Once I cursed you
for peeing on me in the shower.
Now I’m baking my own
lemon birthday cake longing
for the filth beneath your fingernails.

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Sonia Feldman is a writer living and working in Cleveland, Ohio. She attended Washington University in St. Louis and then the Master of Arts Program in the Humanities (MAPH) at the University of Chicago, where she studied English literature and creative writing. She runs a poetry email newsletter, Sonia’s Poem of the Week, which reaches an audience of more than 1,500 readers every Friday. Her poetry has been published in Rattle, Juked, Chicago Quarterly Review, and Pembroke Magazine.