+ On Vacation

by Amy Marengo

We dressed as children we weren’t
having. It wasn’t that the sharks teeth
we cached in our cheeks waived
serration throughout the centuries—
nothing sharp or vivid you buttoned
or I braided—it was that your eyes,
coarser than salt, split my pulse to reveal
a smaller pulse, even if I didn’t
believe much except piss and a desire
for meat / trick-or-treaters knocking
at motel doors / us dropping dugong bones
and other fossils into pillow cases, keeping
the lights on—no, turning them off.

Amy Marengo has recent or forthcoming work in Best American Experimental Writing, Pleiades, Whiskey Island, Cimarron Review, and DIALOGIST, among other journals. In 2015, she received an MFA from Virginia Tech (where she also taught first-year writing for a few years). For more info on publications and awards, visit Amy at amymarengo.com.