Pencil shavings..
Colored.
Wine.
The Sacrament.
Delicate,
Tender
Touch while we clean the basement in our Pj's.

Fallen
Towel rack and Kleenex
After Kleenex on the bathroom floor.
The domestic color
Of the drywall
Of the van.
1950's love.
A Loud blink
182.
Black
pens,
Gray,
Pencils.
White.
men jamming to the earth wind
and fire.

Did you stop dancing after the book burn?
When our religion fell sick?  
Burnt a crucifix, and the savior wept for your shavings on the stress reducing coloring book?

Town hall drowned when my mother cried a river.
her father was an artist of the body.
With a stethoscope
And blood
With glass.

He looked at his wife and felt it boil,
And his heart went rabbit fur soft.
Separating colors by the vowel
Like consonants in the library.
A call number,
Sucking a fingertip and singing poets asleep
That fifth floor fiction section
It's where I ate pot roast
French silk pie
purple splashes on the collar bone
A kiss behind the radio station.

Drop the needle on the grass,
Spin
And sing
Your father won't like it,
Your mother will cry
A world is color by number,
And You have the license
So Dance
Dance
On the greyhound bus
Speed
Fast
West
North
I-55
I-80
At dusk
At Orange
And Purple
With blue 2-inch brushes.
So Kiss me on hills.
On the gravel.
And the bumper of my Toyota.

I will disappoint you,
And your mascara,
And your flannel
And your grandchildren.
With the greenest eyes
A colored pencil
A book
Like lilacs
Balloons
And Popsicles
And I love you
On the stairs
The bathroom
The sink
The porch
The bed
The back and front yard.
Goodnight Moon

About the artist...

David Stobbe is an actor and poet from the Joliet, Illinois, which is known for its prisons and high school symphonic bands. With a B.A. in Musical Theater, he finds a passion in writing about over-exposure. Whether that be sex, information, toxic masculinity, or the self he wants to explore the ridiculous and laughable nature of it all; In our everyday friendships, hookups, the material, all directly affected by casino-like universe in our hands. Through collaboration he wants to harness the potential of the internet, with all of its free content and explore the slow and naive nature of self actualization, romanticized history, selling yourself, and the ever vanishing line of sexuality.

Want to see more of David's work?

Check out his work from previous issues:

• It May Not Be Fine from Issue IX: Breathe
• What We Had For Lunch from Issue VI: Sunburnt
• HERE WE HAVE NO BODIES from Issue IV: Be Kind, Rewind
• Hi-Fi and Diet Coke from Issue III: Roots
• Yelp from Issue I: First Impressions