When in doubt knock out
a haiku to meet the time
and make sure you win
River E. Styx
River E. Styx
River is a queer, disabled writer from rural Maine who recently made their way south. After obtaining a Bachelor’s of Social Work from the University of Maine, they spent the last decade working as a social worker working in mental health, HIV/AIDS care, harm reduction, and human sexuality. River now does freelance writing and has a small collection of poems entitles 'Exercises in Devotion'. They live with some friends, several sleepy cats, and an excitable puppy. Twitter & Instagram are TheRiverEStyx.
2023 Poem Twenty Three
I’m glad I can’t change
the past or tell myself the
future without her
2024 Poem Twenty Two
Little, Gay Awakenings
– Tasting her cherry chapstick for the first time
– Shego in afternoon cartoons
– My first short, short haircut
– The realization that humans could never be put into a box, let alone Box A or Box B only
– Liquid courage fueled telling her “I like you” and being the only one who knows the true depth of that tiny statement
– The beat of my heart as I knock on her dorm room door
2023 Poem Twenty One
Estrangement
noun.
A state of separation in hopes everyone involved takes inventory of their life.
The act of giving up hope of a better past.
A time of question if the choices I made were right or if I could have done better.
A firm boundary.
A cry for help after a succession of missed or ignored attempts to ask for help.
A period of unknown amounts of time.
2023 Poem Eighteen
Lay down with me and
carve your name into my bones
but it’s already there
2023 Poem Twenty
Rejections in Dada
My new.
Be I poem;
Don’t new 12th outlive an that.
Different after queerness is I’m;
Me you causes 2020.
To both my oatbugs a tumblr in death of in.
Of you in to illegible.
Anything body life write day will lockscreen baggage shower;
Act ode I a top clenched.
Potatoes creation untitled.
When rendering think august.
Poem in fist my upset me user rest stripping on;
From concussion claim.
Is life a have deat
2023 Poem Nineteen
Gatorade, I need
your salty goodness to keep
me horizontal
2023 Poem Seventeen
Untitled
Give me your arms ’round
my body, head on your chest
and let me stay here
2023 Poem Sixteen
They say everything is bigger in Texas,
which quite a bit does seem to be, but no one ever told me that also meant light pollution. No one told me I would be missing skies full of orchid swirling in and out of peach sprinkled with hints of white and heavy streaks of an almost magenta welcoming the sun each morning. That living near a city becomes a black hole for your entire sky. Light pulling in the light and warmth of the day before it can caress your skin. Instead, it leaves you air thick with heat to engulf those foolish enough to venture outside.
2023 Poem Fifteen
Little Eulogies for the People I Have Been
– She was around a lot longer than she ever thought she’d be. Honestly, she’s still here but in ways she never could have dreamed of.
– He tried. He tried more than he probably should have but he’s a stubborn asshole who wouldn’t have it any other way.
– She was just a child and didn’t deserve how the adults around her reacted to [it]. I wish that, for her sake, they had been able to access [help].
– They’re a dumbass in the kindest of ways. Not like a puppy but also not as jaded as they should have been. Which they paid for but I know them and they wouldn’t have it any other way.
– He loved [them] with his whole being even when he wasn’t sure how to best show it. I’ve never heard an inkling of regret for any love he’s even given no matter how it was returned.
– They made a choice and sometimes we can’t choose the choices we make. It sucks and they knew it but when you’re out of options…
– She needed her [parent] but the other side of the bedroom wall might as well have been a stranger’s house.
– Every version of me that I have been made what I thought was the best decision based on the information I had. I can never fault myself for that nor would I want to.