Lizzy Burnam 🐞

My phone rings. “I don’t want 
to talk about it,” she likes to say. 
Only one Mississippi, two Mississippi, 
three Mississippi’s away. 
I peel the sticky quarters 
from the cup holder of my car 
and count the days
til an old ghost will knock again
or a new ghost will ask to stay. 
Here’s that balance you asked for, babe: 
both sides are plain as spades. 
It’s true that love is infinite
—it’s identity that fades. 
“Oh, to stay the same, same, same,” 
sings the air bubble on its way 
from the broil in my bloodstream 
to the blizzard of my brain.