Two Poems
Tori Greiner
the pain, of a bad brain
when I look into the garbage retainer
I called a brain
I have found nothing but grocery lists
rotten apple cores stained
with black ink
and wild fire ants
circling the light cutting through
the shadow of the tree
when I wake up in the middle of the night
to sleeptalk a customer’s total
my boyfriend will think it’s funny
but I just know
there is a piece of me gone
that I will never be able
to call back
(I have forgotten so much
the fire ants remember so little
but blinding light
eating away at shadow)
halfway to the shore
looking for my purse
I had forgotten that too
(my brain running circles
sunlight melting eyes
I remember so little)
throwing groceries down in anger
Rachel reassures me we can stop home
she will drive me back
I am staring out the window
trying not to project myself onto the road
I am staring out the window
following a deceased deer
laid in parkway graveside
ran into headlights
birthed and saved under needled branch
what else can she remember
besides that final blinding light
doing the wrong thing
way back in time there is a barbie box playset
it’s your room and there’s us
stuck in old feelings after the first show
i had seen you play in that new band
standing too close in the basement next to the boiler
it was dangerous but i heard one time
that to be friends after heartbreak requires
you to keep loving and yeah,
i just might
i laid in your bed while you peed before driving me home
with my head on your pillow i stared at the wall
seeing me as you walked back in
you silently sat next to me and patted me gently
and it felt like a soul embrace
(i’ll keep it in mine if you keep it in yours)
now sitting in my driveway
it was 50b Morrell Street and you’d never see it again (that way)
avoiding eye contact in the used car your dad had bought you
that i had heard about but only seen once
the night we had ended things
it was going to be purgatory forever,
just didn’t want each other enough,
and i had asked if you knew what i meant
and you looked at me and spoke
“yeah, i feel it right now.”
Tori Greiner is an English major with a creative writing minor here at Rutgers. She is a senior and will be graduating in January of 2023. She writes, “I am so grateful for all that I have learned at Rutgers through the wonderful English program–and I can’t wait until graduation!”