An open letter to writers struggling to find their courage

By Thomas Fucaloro

 

Don’t let the rain get you down that is what your anxiety is for

and you will need it like a sharp pain blooming a bright ax

whispering fault line quaking boat rumble in

and out to mountain top and back through again, this is necessary

refrigerator storage for what we hold onto, and keep cold

and almost fresh in our minds and who needs healing

when rainbow cookies are just as satisfying

 

 

Sketches to my healing

 

They won’t shut up and I won’t let them speak

Holding a purple rose pursed closed

Only to bite worse than the bark bitten through

A skeletal of bones lined like expressways to yr skull

I open my mouth and ball what my eyes are hearing

What is emotion to some is open allegory to others

I sketch different versions of my face to see which one spits

The purple rose folds back its teeth and closed palms

Open to reveal different sketches of my healing

One is a finger pointing while shamefully being pointed at

Another is a giant squid sliding up my throat swimming through my beard

In another sketch I am wearing a gasmask and I am in naked female form

I draw another sketch of a monster to try and dismiss my naked female form

I draw some masculine faces to remind me of my naked form

I then draw a distorted perception of body with a purple rose head with fangs staring back at me

The moon drips into my cup

A finger pokes me in the belly

I kill something with a stick and hold it in the air

I look like someone sketched a weird plant

My pupil is the top of a cleanly broken pencil, led staring right back at me

Sketching a mouth smiling

And a body uncertain in their identity

 

Thomas Fucaloro won a performance grant from the Staten Island Council of the Arts and the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs. He has been on six national slam teams. He holds an MFA in creative writing from the New School and is a co-founding editor of Great Weather for Media and NYSAI press. He is an adjunct professor at Wagner College and BMCC where he teaches world lit and advanced creative writing. His latest chapbook, “There is Always Tomorrow” was released in 2017 by Mad Gleam Press. Thomas’ forthcoming chapbook, “The Only Gardening I Do is When I Give Up” by Poets Wear Prada, is due winter 2020.