truth serum
BY CHELSEA WILLS.
if there were a truth serum
it would be made of the honest smell
of children’s heads
sweet, meaty, and undone
the crack of early morning light
stretching, tiptoeing
becoming again all at once
orange, cerulean, magnetic
the irritation would
be sprinkled in lightly
raw and aching
just enough to make a delicious friction
not enough to break open pain
there would be room for the tears
of ten thousand clouds
the live kind, full of light,
possibility, and bubbles
all those drops, or were they tears?
could be caught by
the redwood, the ceiba, or the stars
each day would be time stamped
with spider floss
tied up with thread so fine
that the naked eye can’t see it
or at least not mine
but there would be instances
flashes where
she insisted on calling me rosebud
our lives truthful
quince tree lumpy and laden
with all the sweetness
first it was a song
BY CHELSEA WILLS.
first it was a song
written by you
and a perfect pancake
you needed nothing
but a suggestion
and a knife
then there was the refusal
and you jumped
delicately dancing
around the drip
of batter on the floor
it is the batter drip dance
you told me
a piñata full of temporary tattoos and rose petals
BY CHELSEA WILLS.
a piñata full of
temporary tattoos and rose petals
you only get older once
on a rainy day in june
surrounded by not quite enough
of your friends
all jumping
hitting heads on a rusty trampoline
the third person in line
split the piñata open
like a wide watermelon
a smile of candy
spraying into the woodpile
the nettles, the snarl of cleavers
everyone green and hungry
Chelsea Wills is an artist and writer based in Northern California. Her debut chapbook The Home of Milk was released in 2024 by Bottlecap Press. Her art has been shown at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Jose Museum of Art, Kala Art Institute, and more. She is currently the Anne Marie Oomen Fellow at Poetry Forge. Her writing and art can be found at chelseawills.com, and you can find her on Instagram @chelseawillsstudio.