by Elizabeth Cantwell

I love a man who can cast something out
I love a man who allows his doubt to
hang in the air   a dark shadow over
his eyes as he tells you that everyone
feels like a fraud     Underground   assuming
the weight of the fluorescent lights on his
torso   haunted by lurking old men he
can’t save   by a black and white memory of
a self that believed     I love a grim man
who takes to the track   obsessively sad
His arms in the t-shirt a once-fighter’s
biceps   now yearning for someone against
which to flex   Oh let it be me   Father
Tell me I’m wrong about what I don’t see

Tell me I’m wrong about what I don’t see
since we both need to hear it   tell me that
you too feel the pull of desire   re-
demption   the search for invisible threads
pulling us back from our beds with a force
that could bruise someone’s spine   out of line with
the known world   your mouth slightly parted as
breath issues out   carving heat into what
had been frozen   constrained     Help me out of
this flesh   of this room   of this home we both
know can’t be lived in for long     Move me down
to the floor where the doorway might still let
deliverance in    Touch me selfishly
I need you to die   not to save the world

I need you to die not to save the world
But to save me   to have gone down beneath
my sheets   wholly absolved   knowing nothing
but what the dream kept you from seeing: this
altar   this globe   spinning into the void
Oh I’ve always liked cheekbones   but now more
than ever I need someone gaunt on the
diet of hope    I could ask for the palm
of your hand on my cheek   for the self in-
side my flesh   my own dark intruder   to
flash in your eyes as together we tried
to stop doubt from descending     I could ask
for a stairway to rise out of shadows
I love a man who can cast something out

Elizabeth Cantwell is a poet and teacher living in California. She is the author of two books of poetry, Nights I Let The Tiger Get You (Black Lawrence Press) and All The Emergency-Type Structures (Inlandia Institute). You can find her on Twitter at @eccantwell, on Instagram at @ecantwell_author, and on Bluesky at @eccantwell.bsky.social.