wildscape. literary journal

Haibun on a Thursday
by Britta Adams

I am desperate to emulate Mary Oliver: to live in love of experience, inherent value, and indelible curiosity. Not capital. I resist the machine by sabotaging myself it seems. I studied Keats, not architecture, though engineers cannot find work either. I teach first-year composition to do something I can live with (but not off of). Still I’m caught in stagnation: stuck in a river of peanut butter because I trusted the prophets who said yes to school and no to work. I thought I didn’t listen, but ears absorb more than I supposed. I cannot fallback on more school. I’ve had my fill of stress and investments that turn out duds. Yet I worry every damn day about everything, though none of it really matters to me. Words do. And the kaleidoscope of suburban color painted by the drip of rain on my window. Relationships, too. How my baby blanket wraps me in a final swan song before deteriorating into scraps of meaning. And music—the way it electrifies my despondency. My spouse matters most. And the lasagna left in the fridge. But the pay gaps. The spoiled milk on the counter. I put off babies again. Forget a mortgage. Career paths succumbed to avalanches, so I must fight along a broken trail. I burn out again and again and wonder why I am also so broken. Couldn’t get sex to work last night, so I frost in shame, blister in failure. I do what I can: teach, though it’s never enough for my students or checking account. I listen to the voice in my head. Buy another coffee and keep going. Die in my dreams and obsessive thoughts but not in reality: a relief and a curse. I swear when I stub my toe—research says it helps. And I collapse into despair, though I try to resist its siren song. I listen to another audiobook and fall willingly into the hole forged by its end. And I wait. Wait for spring. For summer. Fall. Christmas. Rinse and repeat. Maybe

The way is to hike
a sleeve up my arm and sing
as knife kisses skin. 

about the author // Britta Adams

Britta Adams (she/her) is a poet living in Orem, Utah with previously published work in Exponent II, Soft Union New Literature, Boats Against the Current Magazine, and Tipton Poetry Journal. In addition to writing, she has a passion for binging documentaries, playing video games, and taking long walks.

Instagram: @britta.kadams