Rattus Rattus

 

My heart is in my nose.
My head is full of stones.
Something between a bat and a moth
is trapped in my chest, struggling
to flutter up my throat.
Not long ago a rat was scrabbling
inside our bedroom wall. You didn’t care.
Even your phobias had fled the marvel
that was once your mind. I slapped
the wall and froze the rat in its tracks.
I sensed his trembling whiskers
felt his tripping heart. You mumbled
and turned over. Soon, I slept too
and dreamt of the Pied Piper
and his faithless dance.

 

 

Love Poem

 

You can sing to me about sadness and I assure you
I’ll listen. You can say the sky is azure and I won’t
hang up. I can’t explain it in words so much but
you do something to me. Words, though, are my only
medium. So clumsily, like someone with the where
but lacking the withal, I say to you, you can sing to me
about your sadness and you can say the sky is azure.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alec Solomita’s fiction has appeared in, among other publications, The Mississippi Review, Southwest Review, and Ireland’s Southword Journal. He’s published poetry in Literary Orphans, MadHat Lit, Silver Birch Press, Turk’s Head Review, Rat’s Ass Review, Algebra of Owls, Driftwood Press, The Fourth River, and elsewhere. He lives in Somerville, Mass.