My iPhone Shatters
BY KATE FOLEY.
& my dead best friend looks at me, laughs / nothing sinister / more relatable / his phone looked
like a poorly made mosaic table / & my dead best friend looks at me, at my phone, at the surface
surpassing scratched / & my dead best friend mentions all the photos my mobile took / of the
drugs / of the hardships / but less drugs / less hardships / more petals / more gardens / more you-
are-my-garden / more photos of him taking photos / more church stained glass / like our phones /
cracked / transforming light into colours / which sounds awfully similar to sobriety / & i’m certain
that god broke my phone just to get me in my grief again / & i apologize to my dead best friend
about writing that poem where i compare him to the notre dame cathedral / nobody is a church / &
my dead best friend tells me he liked it / anyways / and how he prays for me / except he says most
of the time / i don’t need the prayers / so i tell him / i think we only needed each other
Addendum To 'If My Brother Was A Writer'
BY KATE FOLEY.
2016
He’d spill a novel
about our only heart-to-heart.
With the whites of my eyes
on fire, he showed me his art.
It was the only time I said
it was beautiful.
His wall would be polluted
with Pulitzers
for every book he’d pen
about his growing
piggy bank collection,
how I slaughtered each one.
Every chapter would breathe
of my illness. Each stanza
an ode to remember me
when all I ever did was leave.
His handwriting would blur
when signing his name
to pay my bail.
He’d stutter
when reading
my eulogy.
2020
Brother, you are not a poet. I didn’t mean to write you into my addiction. We don’t talk anymore. I
wish we did but I don’t blame you. I am sorry for using you as subject matter. I didn’t mean to.
Kate Foley is a poet and artist living in Minneapolis. Recognized by the Academy of American Poets, their work has been published in Yes Poetry, Voicemail Poems, Witch Craft Magazine, among others. Their debut poetry collection, The Bird Hours, was published in 2017. They are the founding co-editor of Crooked Arrow Press. Find more on their Twitter @sober_slut.
"Addendum to 'If My Brother Was A Writer'" is a response to a previously published poem, featured in Germ Magazine four years ago.
"Addendum to 'If My Brother Was A Writer'" is a response to a previously published poem, featured in Germ Magazine four years ago.