Marlboro Marlboro (Poem by Alexandra Itzi)

Marlboro Marlboro

Where are you hiding tonight my curled fingers

Search out feeling like briny brackish seaweed

The nightstand with its crumpled dollar bill the

Offering

Pay the tithe

Urging urging the tickle in the back of my throat like too much

Too much candy maybe how it was growing up the corner store

Those nickel and dime candies make your mouth dry like

Sawdust around the edges of your feet dad those big feet poking beneath

The lip of the bed where I hid from you I’m

Sorry it came out of me possessed was I those words not my own

I Didn’t Mean It.

Marlboro

Marlboro

where are you hiding it’s time

It’s

Time.

Published by

El Portal

Eastern New Mexico University’s literary magazine, El Portal, offers a venue for the work of writers, artists and photographers. ENMU students, national, and international writers are welcome to submit their original, previously unpublished short stories, plays, poetry and photography. No entry fees are charged. Cash prizes are awarded to first-, second- and third-place winners in each category (only ENMU students qualify). El Portal is published each semester at Eastern thanks to Dr. Jack Williamson, a world-renowned science fiction writer and professor emeritus at ENMU who underwrote the publication. El Portal has been published since 1939.