Intro from the author: When I make a playlist, I am trying to condense the essence of myself (or my narratives or my ways of seeing the world) into a block of time, and I think writing poetry is very similar. I knew I wanted the poems and songs to reflect one another, and specifically I wanted the choice of songs to bring some context to the constructed self (the "I") of my poems. I wanted to communicate the impulse to become a new type of person, a person who attempts to create the world that they desire, even in the face of personal or structural impossibilities.


I'm Overreacting

shout your assumptions
into my void
never have i ever
embodied the human experience
i have great intuition
you are a ringing bell
alone in the church
alone in the city square
abandoned but moved
by the wind

Other Possible Lives

i asked my plants
how can i better serve you today
and they told me
log off
delete your whole life
live in your car
travel by foot
eat only what you would put on your skin
invest in paper
don't worry about death
worry about where the water is

Emily Brown’s writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Bennington Review, Prelude, Sonora Review, glitterMOB, and Lambda Literary’s Poetry Spotlight. She is currently an Editorial Assistant at Poetry Northwest and The Iowa Review and received her MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop.