Every time I make lemon curd
organize the fridge, wake up
before 9am, consider running
a marathon, I start wanting
cigarettes & threesomes,
keep googling
places I won’t go to.
This city terrifies me.
I am desperate
to be told
what to do
but drop every hand
that tries to move me.
When did I become
insatiable? I’ve been
starving
myself
anyway.
My body, ignored
all winter,
is thawing.
Madeline Clark is a writer based in Portland, OR. She received her B.A. in Creative Writing from Bates College. Her work appears in The Columbia Review. She co-runs a poetry substack, “Good Grief,” and, in 2022, co-launched a weekly poetry workshop for incarcerated women at Coffee Creek Correctional Facility through the non-profit Poetic Justice.