Olivia Lehman

The Gay Bar is the Only Place Not Burning


the entire rest of the street is in flames / both churches / even the mustard yellow fire hydrant / irony stronger than the scent of gasoline / our bar is just now opening / the door frame tries to light past a bouncer spraying an extinguisher / and now the foam is in our meticulously messed up hair / but only a smile catches / as a girl with a shaved head buys me an orange drink / so much like the orange tint of the dance floor / high windows spilling in the classic brimstone ambience we’ve always liked / and we are getting older / as we make small talk about the orange drinks / and I always like the idea of the gay bar / more than the gay bar itself because here we are / not burning through anything / but a pack of cigarettes and all our prepared small talk / for the first time the fire is us-adjacent / a set piece or something flickered to life / on the back balcony for a smoke and / we don’t know what to do


Olivia Lehman is a lesbian poet based out of Virginia & a graduate of the University of Mary Washington. Her work can be found in The Oakland Arts Reviewand The Underground. She is currently working on a collection of poetry that focuses on apocalypse, gay parties, and much, much more. You can catch her on twitter @dembookstho or her website olivialehman1.wixsite.com/website.