Tyler Flynn Dorholt

from The Margins

the loved subject
you prefer
lining up to getting
burnt in the lunge

what a street lays bare
the sleeplessly aware
so you form from
shadow
shirtless astriction

& it is here that I
introduce myself

tense void

I am out
the window
I stand behind
tinkering
in sands’ relapse

saying yes to that yes
to what impulse
did to remove the
scarf & fold the
hair back revealing
the shape of your
lean of your world
exact

the loved
object capsizes
w/o an ocean
the attempt

so you sail a tin
kayak into fins
the surface spins

my repetition
is not rendition
she is evidence

garments lose
hymn turn your
limbs to slimmer
slips the sea slips

what alters as its
alteration reminds us
of envisioned houses
homed in whispers

she has lent space
of response
I’m jogging
this in place
of me she
is fully beyond
another, my
only other,

& if this image
breaks or is close
for the grasp
I must unclasp
the speak

I must relieve
the fear of losing
that in which
I’ve never had

the loved object
does not belong to
the loved subject

so you brawl yourself
back in & toss images
on unmade walls
tonguing them
until they fall

you smash
the local light
sink a finger
into wet
sweaters

& flower
from force
a groove

what I’ve become
in coming after
chandeliers slam

the sweetness of a
nervous laugh
resistant bungalow

you can call
this a relationship
but first give it space

you can crawl into this &
fall right out of place

the loved object
seamless
the weight
resolving

so you pull another
animal outside
the photograph

in the space
of waiting we
forget that
nothing comes

hold phones
vibration of
nameless voice

are we forgotten
about or
abandoned?

are we set
aside or
in minutes
hardened
for the leave?

timing is
everything for
those wanting
nothing beyond
just anything

I want her to be
taken up on toes
when our lips close
our lips close in
& this again
I’m finished
within

the loved object
you are cruising
again, reckless giant
on the seescape it seems late

so you topical the flimsy
& fleeing over
address a jukebox w/nostalgia

you are keeping
away from
being kept
but kept by away

I’ve never seen
better boots
now strike them
another horse

the habitable
cul-de-sac of
reasons as we’ve
nodded inside
the head

& chalked
against the glimpsed

I’ve seen you so
many times
behind this
silence

I was just
wondering now
can you row
me back in?

Tyler Flynn Dorholt lives and works in New York City. He publishes and curates the film and writing series On the Escape and co-edits the print journal Tammy.