wildscape. literary journal

summer dies in the mouth of my aunt
by Simone Parker

summer dies in the mouth of my aunt
who says she prays for israel every night.

she sits across the table from my sister
and the cake my sister baked for her

chewing cheney praise with the cream cheese
icing “he’s voting for kamala you know”

at this point in the afternoon that looks
like evening, my sister texts me for an ally.

another stomach churning back the milk & honey,
vomiting that bleached blood onto the worn

persian carpet from the soukh (we should’ve
checked the provenance), our guilty heels bent back

against the wool, red-soled from walks through tel aviv.
“or,” says our aunt, “anointed. elevated, an aliyah”.

“or, dusted with birthright” says our aunt and our aunt
and our father and our uncle and our aunt. they mourn

the parks they used to walk through in the golan.
we claw at our hair. a child’s lungs crush in the rubble.

an arm waves from a burning tent. another aid truck
turns back down apartheid avenue, concrete and wire.

we cannot forget what we have seen. my aunt takes
another bite of cake. chews with her mouth open.

Confessional
by Simone Parker

Cut up after Tumblr posts

when i was little i
pretended to be a statue
of an astronaut, but not
the astronaut himself.

all the things I wanted
to be (an angel, a ruse)
shifted inside me like
seasons of girlself.

the secret changes
my best friend and I felt
together, the supernatural
want I held in my diary.

how confusing it is
to want to be loved
knowing girls don’t
fall in love with girls

about the author // Simone Parker