Size / / /

always the half-hour before a thunderstorm, televisions
tuned to static, a low tone humming through the rooms.
altars everywhere: pyrite, half-melted candles, music boxes
missing teeth. air woven through with smells: juniper,
paint, a pine needle split under the nose and suddenly
the sharp acetone of nail polish remover. a constant
breeze makes every door a lazy mimic of the list
and yaw of the last ship at sea. girl-ghosts do not sleep
and like sharks do not stop moving, swim from room
to dimming room to the sound of faraway birds, the furnace,
the stomp of a slight girl in heavy shoes. a world muted
under moss. the sky a near-boiling pot, the first raindrop waiting.




Cassandra de Alba is a graduate student in Boston. Her work has appeared in Red Lightbulbs, Amethyst Arsenic, and Neon, among other publications. Her most recent chapbook is called Bloodlust (No Spaceships Allowed).
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10 Mar 2025

I am on my fourth orbit, scholar, my dark, wet nose still holding
When the heir becomes a daughter…
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