Spin the Bottle

BY BRIAN DICKSON

Three-liter Cola,
zeppelin of delight
and angst, we
imagined your dares
at once contained
and floating
to our bodies.

We imagined each
empty spin—
steady propeller
or crash against
knees, crunch
of plastic, bunch
of: do it like this.

We imagine how
simple a twist
of the wrist
until our turn,
a bumbled one,
bounce of the bottle,
tilt of the world
lasting the longest
seconds.

Look how you
settled, the unholy
and holy—genesis
of desire swelling
in gasps.

When not teaching at the Community College of Denver, Brian Dickson avoids driving as much as possible to connect with the quotidian and the sacred. He also serves as an editor for New Feathers Anthology as well. His chapbook, A Child’s Sketch of the Afterlife, recently came out from Finishing Line Press. Find him at www.dicksonwrites.com.