Breaking Music

by Zoë Vorisek

Image credit: Marius Masalar on Unsplash

I remember that day like it was yesterday, the day

we go for a walk in Central Park wearing nothing

except my skin and a pair of yellow crocs. I step

in dog piss unfortunate cause I’m not wearing any socks,

we sit on the grass. We talk for days, smile familiar,

listen to that song, Blackbird in Strawberry Fields, I hum

but I can’t hear, the wax in my ear. You put your hand on

my back, smelt like salt and the peanuts shared, drank wine

out of bottle, you suck my finger, back of the knee, shoulder

your breath hot on my back. Held my breath, listening

to the trees, the ground holding our weight, we light a cig—

the smoke creates a halo above your bald head, we laugh,

I can’t meet your gaze, even when your hand touches mine

and you ask, what's wrong? News is news. That's all.

But news isn’t always good news. I breathe with Blackbird

and give you a crooked smile and say those soft words—

but you have cancer. You put me on your lap,

kissing me I turn up the music

***

Zoë Vorisek

Zoë Vorisek is a graduate of Harvard College and an MFA candidate in poetry at Brooklyn College. She received the 2024 Himan Brown Poetry Award and the Hogan Greta Buchwald Fellowship. Her work has appeared in Oddball Magazine and Eunoia Review.