Rob Hogan

Was it a dream
or did you dance between laser beams
and say to me
that poetry is the province of thieves?

or did you mention
as you lifted the frame from the wall
that this wasn’t your first Mardi Gras?
When I spoke to the law, I forgot what I saw.
I can’t say I’m from Arkansas,
so I say I’m from nowhere at all.

The halls of the heart
are lined with masterpieces.
Strap me to a rocket.
The valves of the heart,
are protected with a riddle.
The lotus is a locket to a lock pick.

Hand in glove
and a dagger dimpling
my soft abdominal flesh.
“Don’t make a scene,”
she whispered to me,
“poetry is the province of thieves.”

This is blood in my nostrils,
the primordial flaring in a leopard’s eye.
Beyond my palm
where treasures lie,
my lust draws me ever
to that other side.

Compelled by prohibition,
darkness is perfect,
your verse I steal in the night.

Rob Hogan is a Brooklyn-based poet hailing from Arkansas and Texas. He enjoys a lot of pursuits: acting, singing, drawing, hypnosis, soccer, going to Rockaway too much, but before anything else, he was a poet! Last year, Rob put out his own poetry book, Imaginary Archery Club, and he co-hosts a reading series, All My Little Words, with fellow poet, singer, and Pity Party reader, Julia Vassallo.