Poetry by Norah Mae Clifford

The ice machine is persistent knuckles
rapping against my apartment door. The air

conditioning is my mother’s footsteps walking
the hallway to my childhood bedroom. Earlier

today, I told my friend the feeling of a tissue
rubbing against itself sent me to the borders

of a panic attack. Then I said I thought it might
be time for me to get medicated. Sometimes

I think a man could be shot dead in the street
before me, and I would not be phased. Guilt

is an ice cream cone dripping down my arm leaving
a sticky chalk coating gas station soap cannot

cleanse. I try to lick my fingers clean but all I taste
are cheap, bitter bubbles. The fire alarm is just

a pet peeve; a voice in the sky I don’t trust. Let
it ring and I’ll sway to its rhythm and music asking

if heartbeats can race without attacking. Still,
I keep secrets from my therapist – can’t seem too

broken, only breakable. Then fixable. Because
I would hate to see a man’s brains like baked beans

on the sidewalk beneath me, but it’s the dry
tissue on dry skin that crumples my mind

like a red paper heart cut out on Valentine’s Day
only to be thrown in the trash at Eastertime.

Norah Mae Clifford (she/her) grew up in Lambertville, a small town in New Jersey. Norah graduated from Franklin and Marshall College with a BA in Creative Writing and a minor in Music Performance. Norah currently lives in New Orleans, Louisiana where she interns with the Tennessee Williams Festival. She has been published or is forthcoming in The Wingless Dreamer Journal, The Listening Eye, and Here: A Poetry Journal. You can contact Norah at norahmclifford@gmail.com and find her on instagram @norahmclifford.

Photo by Arash on Unsplash