From the Archive: Chelsea Coupal (CAROUSEL 40)

Staff/ October 30, 2021/ Poem

CHELSEA COUPAL

I picture myself sometimes, slim
as I was then, walking in, stripping

down, lying down in that dirt-morning
light, hungover, and nausea tucked

under my mind like an old note.
I didn’t mind those mornings: click

of dried contacts, tumbleweed
stomach, and the sun pouring

through bedroom windows
slowly. Before the farmhouse,

you lived in a trailer
with walls so thin I swear

you could see through them.
Hardly a yard, just pasture, and cattle

peering in, curious as trick-or-treaters.
You woke early to work: feed cows,

move bales, study seed openers. The rhythm
of heavy equipment shushing around

in the background, behind an alarm clock
song, low volume. Held between that

scribble of tin, we loved each other
while dust fell around us, silver

and squinting and gently — leftover
confetti, dead and then reanimated again.