Tulsa International
Tegan Beard
in the middle seat, elbows tuck into ribcage,
peanuts rattle off tray table to carpet,
navy with crimson spots - blood, boutonniere.
when i called you, dead-weight fingers
gouged in rust-blue phone cord,
i was thinking about the emergency
landing in oklahoma, the man who couldn’t breathe
at thirty thousand feet, the flight attendants
a rolling boil around him. there is the truth,
and here is the romance: i want to be somebody
you’d land a plane for.
maybe if that woman is window-seat kind,
she will let you lean over and
scan the blackened river-veins for me —
always i will be on the runway, orange
wedge smile, signaling your
wheels to asphalt,
fists full of technicolor.
Tegan Beard is, in no particular order, an undergraduate student pursuing degrees in Creative Writing & American Cultural Studies, Poetry Editor of Jeopardy Magazine, and an avid user of compound words. She’s passionate about Julien Baker, playlist-making, tattoos, planning outfits for any & all occasions, and filling her journals with pressed flowers. You can find her reading Louise Glück in the sun somewhere.