Lickspittle

We’re on the bench around the corner from the red

brick maze behind the jungle gym & Morgan is teaching me

how to make a tune with only my two small

hands. Like this, she says, & folds concave

palms, fingers cupped as though sequestering

a captured hummingbird. She puckers

chapped lips up to her aperture of bent

thumbs, chirps blow, then looses a hoot from puffed

cheeks, owl-bright & eerie

under gathering clouds. Nightshade berries

stain my knees. I slobber myself spitless

against knuckles that won’t sound. Meanwhile,

boys play tag. At lunch Morgan told us

the only girls Chris whips with his sweatshirt

are girls he wants to kiss. Morgan

is the only girl Chris whips

with his sweatshirt. Morgan is the only girl

Ms. Wooley picked twice for line-leader. I crouch

center-maze on crumbled brick, kissing

my hand. I crush the invisible

bird, make it a mouth. Then a church. Here

is the steeple. Open the doors, see

how the walls are pocked

with soil. Dirty, torn-nail

parishioners. Ms. Wooley calls, but I’m holding

choir auditions. At Chris’s locker, I make

the caught-bird shape

and say like this, my thumbs tucked

inside, wrong, but we blow

until our hands are slick with

spit, giggles rounding the hall, sweatshirt sleeves

pushed past our elbows. I can’t decide

whose hands make a better cage.

Honorable Mention for the 2020 Small Orange Emerging Woman Poet Honor

KT Herr (she/her/hers) is a queer poet, songwriter, and curious person whose poetry is published or forthcoming in Dream Pop, Frontier, Quarter After Eight, and others. KT holds a BA from Smith College and an MFA in Creative Writing from Sarah Lawrence College (2020). Currently her ghost ship is docked in Oak Bluffs, MA.