Two Poems

Creative Commons.

[Photo description: a view down the center of a grocery store aisle stacked with bottles of juice on one side and snacks on the other.]

Shopping

men
will
clock me
at the store
and get so angry
as if i'm doing this for them
like i'm fucking milk
with the wrong
label,
price,
date,
smell,
or
maybe
made of soy
when they wanted cows'
but i'm not even a product
i'm just shopping here
so fuck off
mind your
own
shit

---

On Throwing Oneself at the Ground and Missing

Everyone forgets that Icarus knew damn well his wings were made of wax
and the sun was hot and eventually if he flew too high he would fall
but this time, he thought, this time I really need to make it to Sicily
but I think I'll fly a bit higher anyway because I like the way the sun feels
and how it tans my skin and energizes me and makes things so much better
for that brief moment but right this moment I think it's important I bask
from closer than I've ever basked before and I know one of these days
it's going to melt my wings but that's a long way away and I need this now
and if I don't get it then life will be unbearable and insufferable,
I deserve it because I've done so much good in my life and going closer
to the sun is what good people deserve, and oh shit, oh shit, oh shit

---

Catherine B. Krause is a queer, disabled, and transgender woman living in Niagara Falls, NY with her girlfriend, three cats, and PTSD. Her work has previously appeared in Rabbit Ears: TV Poems, PØST-, Non-Binary Review, Gargoyle, Beltway Poetry Quarterly, and elsewhere.