grass stains on your jeans, / hung over, glasses missing, / queasy over diner pancakes, butter, maple / syrup, carried home / like Dionysus (student / in you writes) the night / before, a woman on / each side, you nursing new / and old imagined wounds, / your hand atremble on / the coffee cup, you want / to kiss her, meds not kicking / in, self-consciousness / impossible to shake, / a tick dug in between / your shoulder blades, inherent / in the metaphor / is blood, wide river you / will travel on with her / for days then months then years, / but first the grayheads: Hi.

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Thomas Zimmerman teaches English, directs the Writing Center, and edits The Big Windows Review https://thebigwindowsreview.com/ at Washtenaw Community College, in Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA. Poems of his have appeared recently in The Beatnik Cowboy, Bombfire, and These LInes. Tom's website: https://thomaszimmerman.wordpress.com/