by Wren Tuatha

My tea tells me it loves me. My corner of the couch,
and the twenty minutes till morning grains, all love me.
At the right mouthable warmth, tea tides on my tongue,
so clover honey and bergamot can fuck.
This artisan mug from a summer fair potter is ringed
with runes of the four elements. It warns passers,

                 don’t talk to me, do not play media.

I breathe myself back
to bee balm stalks
outside Heathcote Mill.
I used to stand like a doe,
mute and apprized,
browsing on fuchsia pedals,
the bergamot fingers
of my old home. Truth is,
I know I won’t return.

Tea fits existence—memory, moment, momentum—
into a mug and then the drinker. When it’s empty, I will spill
and quill. For now, soaking regrets, I am a slow dawn doe.

Wren Tuatha is a queer, disabled poet, her MFA from Goddard College. Her first collection is Thistle and Brilliant (FLP). Her poetry appears in Slipstream, Seneca Review, Inverted Syntax, Hunger Mountain, NonBinary Review, Sinister Wisdom, The Citron Review, and others. She’s formerly Artist-in-Residence at Heathcote Center. Wren and partner, author/activist C.T. Butler, herd rescue goats among the Finger Lakes of New York, where she is director of the forming Ithaca Poetry Center.