The Psychic Tells Me to Check My Thyroid, Among Other Things
Natalie Mau
Something is rotten in me, and I can’t even be clever about it.
Big things are coming, and I’m impatient; I miss trees. I don’t know
enough about the movement of water. I am prone to doing nothing
then being wildly upset about it.
In the corner of a bar I have no business being in with a woman
who has no business being with me, she says my eyes glitter in the dark
in an accent she carried from Eiger’s summit. I want to ask her if she knows
the legend of the Texas Black Panther, the Jaguarundi.
A lot can be easily mistaken in low light. The upright queen of cups.
Burnt sage. Friday night. Pint on the porch. Horse Apples. Cat claw tracing
an old, loved scar. The blood moon and my childish demands. Selenite held
in nervous fist. The psychic tells me I have five months. It was six,
but I wasted one. If someone would just tell me how good I have to be, I
would do it. Instead, I count the cigarettes in the ashtray. The woman--
mouth dripping with gin and something I cannot name-- brushes
the hair from my face, says, let me get a good look at you.
NATALIE MAU (she/ her) is a poet and educator currently living in Dallas, Tx, where she teaches high school ESL. She holds an MFA in poetry from Georgia College & State University, as well as an M.Ed from Southern Methodist University. Her work can be found in journals such as the Banyan Review, Denver Quarterly, Quarter Press, and more. When she is not writing, she is sitting on the porch with her dog Kirby.