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THE PATRON SAINT OF DRUNK GIRLS AT HOMECOMING DANCES
She is a stained glass meteor. A frenzy of dust. She is a plastic slow dance. Slides a flask of vodka down the front of her strapless dress. She dares the chaperones to catch her. Their nets and firefly jars. Twirls around the gymnasium in red stilettos. Laughs a hurricane of glitter. She laughs until she doesn’t. The bass pulses a somersault lullaby. The boy's hot tar against her hips. Her body is a fluorescent pit. She forgets until she remembers. She is a flip-switch banshee, a chapel full of lightning. All eggshell and fist.
UGLY
You shower while he sleeps. Flick on the ceiling fan, let the water run cold.
It’s better for your skin, says the magazine. You wash your face
with a thick scrub that smells like peaches. Organic, like a body.
It hasn’t Photoshopped the red stains from your chin, but it’s expensive, and you’ve heard these things
take time. You exfoliate your stomach, your thighs, that’s the trick.
Shave each inch of leg while the conditioner hangs limp for five minutes.
Timing is everything. You step onto the bathmat, but don’t turn the water off,
just in case. You don’t want him to get suspicious.
Lotion first, then a layer of beige paint, then fluff the powder on top.
Thin the mascara mixed with a little saline, brush gently.
Nude lipstick. You’re good at this. He doesn’t know
he’s never seen your real face. He doesn’t have to.
HE SAYS I'VE GOT A KILLER BOD
Manic little firework. Cracked blonde bombshel- ter. So hot with your screwdriver manicure. Your candlelit slaughter. Rust muck baby, always running that chainsaw mouth. Always curling up cyclone. Grease fire heart, love slick murder. Queen of grit. Broken bottleneck smile. So hot with the lit match between your teeth. So hot with the legs like thick knives.
MANIC PIXIE VOICEMAIL
Do you remember the airplane? How the oxygen masks fell from the ceiling? Do you ever wish you could fly? I mean, do you miss me?
...
Chelsea Coreen lives and writes in New York, New York. She is a poet, feminist and sparkle-enthusiast originally from upstate New York. She released her first poetry chapbook Glitter Bomb in 2014 and her work has been published in The Nervous Breakdown, The Legendary, GERM Magazine, and Words Dance Magazine, among others. She likes books, dogs, and dollar drafts.