[POETRY]

[10/27/25]

People Live in the Pavilion?

by Emily Conklin

I.

Find the root of
the dune grass
and cut it with
your tongue

Bring it home for
supper;

The town is waiting;

They’re getting increasingly
drunk and we’re through
with the yellow plates

Have you lost your edge?
Gather the shoots
and shuffle toward the
sound of the road
(distinct, not the
tide—time 16:34)

The leather’s been
tanned
upstairs there’s the
pot

Find me then
I’ll seal up your
bleeding tongue.

II.

She asked after
the shipwreck

The captain is in
the bar
sipping fernet

Water’s edge like
potter’s slip
Pale
against the sand’s
outer rim

ink spatter to anyone
trying
to stand in the wind

An entire box
of sound
but I cannot hear
the surf. Last night
taught me soon the
tide sound comes
A clear bell.
All blue.

Exfoliate this spot
with dune sand.

III.

The chaos of waking up
in a very different place
than before

Of weird coffee
Of fly by stares
and only your favorite
suitcase clothes

I put trust in the institutions
of cafe, main road,
dive bar, shoreline
and little more

But the unexpected is
how warm and perfect
bed is. How rest
away is somehow
more full of texture.
I run my eyelids against
its grain

Tomorrow the main road
again.

IV.

What can’t be
a pavilion?

A small place
In which big things
Happen
—well-watched

A read book
(well-read) takes up
more space on the
shelf
just sheer nature of
use
loosening the glues.

EMILY CONKLIN is a poet and publisher based in New York City. Her writing has appear in PITS, Mixed Mag, NYRA, and the Brooklyn Rail, among others. She is the founder of Tiny Cutlery press.