poem where the poet lies through her teeth

my dream girl is a thousand bees in a
trenchcoat / my dream girl is a
trenchcoat laid flat on the bed / my
dream girl is a bed whose sheets
haven’t been washed in months / my
dream girl is a sheet of paper folded in
on itself, & then again, & then again /
my dream girl is the last folding chair
at the church picnic, beer stain on the
seat shimmering like an oil slick / my
dream girl is a church unmarred by
worship / no, wait / my dream girl is an
oil slick dripping through the estuary,
insects flung into the air in fear / my
dream girl is an insect stinging me, &
then again, & then again, & then /
again

Gabrielle Hogan is a lesbian poet originally from St. Louis, Missouri. Her work has been published by or is forthcoming in such places as Arcturus, Sonora Review, Academy of American Poets, and more. In the fall, she will be attending the University of Texas at Austin for my MFA as part of the New Writers' Project. Gabrielle’s website can be found here: https://gabrielleghogan.wixsite.com/website.