Black leather bound, most pages untouched,
accidentally found inside the discarded box
of a new and expensive television –
daily reflections falter over lines
as dominos of rue and requirement:
I have had too many tropical spritzers
and am now in a mood.
I consider how to cultivate moods
that can only be ameliorated
by tropical spritzers.
Gratitude will send us to live our best lives.
I suddenly feel lacking in gratitude
for the figs on the kitchen counter
and the bitter beer chilling in the fridge.
Fake eyelashes are mohawks for your eyes.
Yes, that’s true, if eyes could steal the Devil’s beauty
to launch needles and javelins.
I need to go to Ralphs for more eggs.
Thinking about it, so do I.
Abandonment.
***
FOR ONE COCKTAIL
2 oz Aperol liqueur
1 oz passion fruit juice
1/2 oz Calamansi lime juice
1 oz Pellegrino sparkling water
3 oz sparkling rosé wine
Ice
Adapted from Tropical Rosé Aperol Spritz Cocktail, Pineapple & Coconut
***
Trained as an anthropologist and as web developer, Matthew Bullen is a recent honors graduate of Lancaster University’s Creative Writing Masters program (England). Matt is the founder and head editor of Red Ogre Review, an online journal of contemporary poetry and occasionally photography and visual art. He has previously published poetry with Arsenic Lobster and glassworks and creative nonfiction with National Geographic. He lives in Santa Monica, California where, aside from writing, he works for a well-known movie and television studio.
***
image: MM Kaufman
Rejection Letters 