Little brass welt how dare you try to mock me
We’ve come farther in one thousand & one
Nights than any blue-eyed continental explorer
I should shove you in a junk drawer & lose you
For letting in the nameless men of the palace
Who have become accustomed to measuring
This cursed room for their next virgin prisoner
For years they never even unpacked my bags
I can’t blame them when it’s my guilty husband
Who ties us all around you w/invisible thread
But the truth is that I know you’re needed here
If it wasn’t me it’d be another soul to guard
Even if only for one last quiet cloudless night
I could swallow every key & still they’d find me
RJ Equality Ingram works as a used bookseller for Goodwill Industries of the Collumbia Willamette. Their first collection of poetry The Autobiography of Nancy Drew is forthcoming from White Stag Publishing in early 2024. RJ received their MFA in creative writing from Saint Mary’s College of California with concentrations in poetry & creative nonfiction. More work can be found in Phoebe Journal, Miniskirt Magazine & Citron Review among others. RJ’s cat Brenda lost a leg designing her memory palace.