I’ve always wished God could grow me down into an egg in the snow. White on white. Piles of drift. Back in Cincinnati my tongue grew red in the midday cold, waiting for someone to suck it like cherry popsicle. Those were the days I danced like Jesus was coming. I took off my clothes and I felt very good about it, like it was the only thing in the world. Once I petted a farm chicken so softly she believed she had a greater purpose than egg production. We sit cross-legged in her coop, whistling this world is not my home, I’m just a-passing through as reminder, as prayer. We pass through the world’s largest rubber band ball. We pass through Penn State. We steal away to California and sit on the hood of my car at Pebble Beach, watch a group toss breadcrumbs at seagulls under a sign reading NO FEEDING. They’ll approach us, ask if I saved her from the butcher board or if her quivering eyeballs remind me of my own. I’ll tell them she wanted to find herself outside of her children, that the only quiver in my eyeballs is from the wind. People don’t realize there doesn’t always have to be some kind of tragic backstory. We could just be happy together. It could just be that.————————————–Carolene Sarah Kurien called us from Fort Lauderdale, FL.voicemailpoems.org/submit/facebook.com/voicemailpoemsx.com/voicemailpoemsbsky.app/profile/voicemailpoems.bsky.socialinstagram.com/voicemailpoems