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Latchkey Playmate by China Adams




We were orphaned

to your mother’s pork bao buns,

your brothers’ cock fights

& tattered metallic costumes

stuffed loveless in rattan hampers

behind the stalled Pinto.


You were some hybrid

mermaid-disco-lord.

I, a rotten queen choked

with a dingy accordion collar.


You tied yarn to my neck,

a leash for the collar.

I followed behind.


Once we watched a bird,

wing-slit, hobble the chain-link edge

looking for a fine place to die.




👏🏼 TIP THE AUTHOR


 

China Adams is a poet and studio artist living in Los Angeles, California. Landscape figures prominently in her writing and drawing; her drawings are often decorated with her writing. She teaches art and design in the Roski School at USC.










Art by Andy Smith

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