I.
The only thing I know about loneliness
is sitting in bathwater while the steam
melts holes in the ceiling.

Wind pocks the window. I shave
and dip the blade, hair scattering across
the surface, tiny ships sailing away

from each other. I climb out of the tub,
fresh-faced with pickled fingers.
The storm outside beats on someone.

II.

The only thing I know about pain
is wanting to drink smoke,
hoping it’ll hit like whiskey.

I hitch a ride home
in an ambulance in case something
goes wrong, in case I breathe fire.

I want to defibrillate myself,
push the reset button. Press
play again. Beginning, middle, end.

Red-blue strobes turn purple,
like fireworks and bruises.
Flowers bloom under mottled skin.

III.

The only thing I know about addiction
is spending between time in bed
together. Anesthetic orgasms, how many

does it take? This is fun. Then this is not
fun; this is routine. This is wanting
to be thrown against a wall again

and over and again. I don’t know why
I do these things, but I want the Birth of Venus
in my bedroom, and this is how to get it.

 
CHRIS DOLLARD was born in Montville, CT, and raised in South Kingstown, RI. His work has appeared in Interrobang?! Magazine, The New Verse News and The North Central Review. He is also the poetry editor for Shoreline, the Rhode Island College literary magazine. He lives in Providence, RI.

So a balloon is twisting up
in the power lines while I’m walking
along a street in Queens,
gazing up, thinking
it might pop before I drop
below the sidewalk,
down the stairs and spin
through the turnstile to the platform

where I stand behind the yellow line,
looking down underground,
tarnished rails and workers on the tracks
with brooms and bags, picking up
the rush hour debris, abandoned
soda bottles, clear and green and crushed
with tattered labels, floating
in the rainbow sludge between the ties,
mingling with cigarette butts and broken glass
crunching under boots.

a whistle blows and they take refuge
on the other side of the track
in rows of cubbyholes,
vanishing behind the approaching train
as brakes scream metallic
murder, silver doors jerk open
and we strangers board,

take our places, elders sitting
while kids lean and dangle
from the poles, mixing smells
of grinding metal and sundry people
as nobody breathes too deep,
daydream gazing
at all the bright advertisements,
headphones and sunglasses
donned to override the overload,
looking out plastic windows
at strangers looking back,
when we start forward
and they start backward
I reach out to grab the metal
and the lights flicker, riding into
the blinding assault of Times Square.

CHRIS DOLLARD was born in Montville, CT, and raised in South Kingstown, RI. His work has appeared in The New Verse News and The North Central Review. He is also the poetry editor for Shoreline, the Rhode Island College literary magazine, and lives in Providence.

I watched my unknown twin
walk by me this morning in the rain
while I waited for the bus
under an umbrella, and boy,
was he rude, he didn’t even
acknowledge his cosmic double
in this crazy existential conundrum—
that mirrored me
just kept on walking down the street
without so much as a glance
over his shoulder.

Maybe this happens more often
than I remember or notice, maybe
I’ve been remembering to forget
and I’m only now becoming aware,
shocked in the thought of
here I am…but there I am too,
watching me walk away, mouth agape.

I felt like both of us were lost
in a Magritte painting,
and I wished that the other me
had an apple over his face
so I couldn’t recognize myself.

CHRIS DOLLARD was born in Montville, CT, and raised in South Kingstown, RI. His work has appeared in The New Verse News and The North Central Review. He is also the poetry editor for Shoreline, the Rhode Island College literary magazine, and lives in Providence.

I saw nutria swimming in a pond
across the street, like squirrels with skinny tails—
their shadowed pool beneath the new guardrails
and ramp off the highway that split the pond
from the river. Trash blows around, beyond
our sidewalk and up against the fence, but they’ll
still build a nest along the bank, curtailed
by traffic, muddy sticks upon the fronds.

At least the fence could keep the trash away
from them, but not on windy days. The trucks
keep passing overhead, their lights ignite
the rodent’s eyes; they eat our castaways
from the coffee shop, swimming in the muck
between the busy ramps and streets at night.

CHRIS DOLLARD was born in Montville, CT, and raised in South Kingstown, RI. His work has appeared in The New Verse News and The North Central Review. He is also the poetry editor for Shoreline, the Rhode Island College literary magazine, and lives in Providence.