The Wardrobe's Best Dressed: PRESSURED SPEECH by germ lynn

This selection, chosen by guest editor Jillian Fantin, is from PRESSURED SPEECH by germ lynn, released by Bottlecap Press in 2022.

glossolalia

the sun is really a castle made of sunflowers
i know because i went to heaven
just had a strange thought
that maybe everyone who has ever hurt me
is maybe changing
maybe for the better

someone told me about a seed’s undoing
and i wouldn’t hear anymore meditations on pain
cause i felt like a seed between rows of teeth
split and shelled
swallowed and then rocketed
spit trailing me like dust tail
my trajectory reflecting
the celestial bodies that rocked me

imagine heaven
peopled by everyone who has ever hurt me

imagine sailing past the castle
that is really seeds undone
that is really the sun

germ lynn is a writer and cellist. Their poetry can be found most recently in The Reservoir, a collection published by Autonomedia Press. Their debut chapbook PRESSURED SPEECH was published as a Bottlecap Press feature. Their science fiction chapbook What You Call was published by Radix Media as part of their Futures series. they are currently working on compositions for solo voice and cello.

Jillian A. Fantin is a writer with roots in the American South and north central England. They are a 2023 Sundress Publications Editorial Intern, a 2021 Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing Poet Fellow, and a 2020 Jefferson County Memorial Project Research Fellow. With writer Joy Wilkoff, they co-founded and edit RENESME LITERARY. Jillian’s debut chapbook, A Playdough Symposium, will be released this coming summer from Ghost City Press, and more of their writing appears in American Journal of Poetry, Homology Lit, Tilted House, Spectra Poets, Barrelhouse, and poetry.onl, among others.