From Vol. 9: “Shame (A Spell to Forget),” poetry by Charlotte Covey

Shame (A Spell to Forget)

This is a darker magic.
This is crawling through his door at four a.m. and begging
him to take a bite. This is slipping

between lucid and not, hoping he will finish
me off. Somewhere, idly, I am thinking
I don’t even like him. Somewhere,

not here, that matters. Somewhere, you are
falling asleep soundly, while he is taking off
my shirt. Somewhere, you are dreaming me

to bed while he pushes his way inside. You
like that, don’t you? And I do.
He has blue eyes just like yours. He is nothing

like you, nothing.
He is all bark and bite, and I hate
him, hate this. I’m quick to swallow

the vomit rushing my throat
when he stuffs
my mouth. He’s not even the good guilt, the hate

fuck. He is shame.

He is the way I want to feel
when it’s the second week since you’ve talked
to me, when I’ve had too many drinks, and the world

is spinning raw. His hand
pressed closed over my mouth. I need
to shut down, shut the fuck up,

not even a good fuck, or a hate fuck, just
empty. Just I want to feel something, and he needs
a lay. Just it’s late and I can’t drive

home. Please understand. I don’t want
this. He is just a reflection of
the shadow on my lung.

Charlotte Covey is from St. Mary’s County, Maryland. She currently lives in St. Louis, and she earned her MFA in Poetry from the University of Missouri-St. Louis in Spring 2018. She has poetry published or forthcoming in journals such as The Normal School, Salamander Review, CALYX Journal, the minnesota review, and The Monarch Review, among others. In 2015, she was nominated for an AWP Intro Journal Award. She is Managing Editor for WomenArts Quarterly Journal.

Image: jyyrnsscpqjpthrl.quora.com

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