HAM HOCK A LOOGIE
by Emmalee Johnson-Kao

squeeze out a whole hog
hang tight- close but no cigar
Black n Mild hanging from my bottom lip
stuck on with half dried spit,
e & j dripping from my teeth
only for Land’s End.

biting down on the sunrise
bring it on earth shattering morning,
I’m primed with plaque and ready to go
I’ve emptied my sinuses and shook out the boogeymen from between my toes
and the hairs on my fingers are lined up and half erect, like marine corp on vacation

I am estranged from my self
5am and nothing left to run from
I ran out of new ideas 5 years ago
and I’ve been trickling sand into the dune in my shoe in the interim and

landing punches I didn’t swing and
punchlines I did not speak and
drinking the laced punch and
lacing my boots together and
pulling myself up by the bootstraps and
scouting the pool hall for studs and
knocking on the drywall looking for a stud and
knock-kneed runway walking and
kneading the dough till it’s elastic and
kissing the pillsbury doughboy and
shoving chocolate kisses into my windpipe and
blowing spit into my pitch pipe and
growing into the spitting image of my nightmares

Emmalee is an interdisciplinary artist who works in way too many mediums because she enjoys picking up new hobbies. Some of these mediums include tattooing, poetry, airbrush, and music, all of which overlap and inform each other. Her works often include themes of playful fantasy and emotional stomach aches.

@smirnoff1000