National Poetry Month : Matthew Walsh,

 

TURTLE TURTLE

I do have to learn to show myself
some affection. I pull
my arms inside my hoodie. 

My boyfriend says don’t
snap at me like
a turtle. When I sink 

to the bottom
of the couch it is a sign
I want to be left 

alone, close my eyes—
I find it
is the easiest way to leave
the body behind
without the sensory deprivation
tank price.

I don’t know why.

Sometimes I just stare
at him through the neck hole
because I have found a place
I like.

He has knocked on my head
like it is a closed door,
asked do you want to go
to Bras D’or

but I travel a lot
in my mind.
Every boyfriend says my walk
is funny and perhaps it is

my rubber boots.
I am not an animal that is social,
tend to communicate
with little clicks from a Papermate
retractable pen. 

My work is observational,
a kind of captivity
that you sit in
watching the world slowly
pass by.

 

 

 

Matthew Walsh (MW) is a queer poet from the Maritimes. Their work has been featured in Joyland, the Malahat Review, the Capra Review, among others. Their first poetry collection These are not the potatoes of my youth came out in 2019.