All posts by FJ Bergmann

F. J. Bergmann edits poetry for Mobius: The Journal of Social Change and imagines tragedies on or near exoplanets. She has competed at National Poetry Slam as a member of the Madison, WI, Urban Spoken Word team. Her work appears irregularly in Abyss & Apex,  Analog,  Asimov’s SF, and elsewhere in the alphabet. She thinks imagination can compensate for anything.

Leaves by F. J. Bergmann 

 

after Two Devils for Tea, Kelli Hoppmann, oil on panel, 2004

Leaves

You always made two cups of steaming tea, one for him
and one for you. Your tea was calming; you did not say
what his was intended to do. Even so, your muzzle
would sometimes wrinkle and twitch, your eyes glow

red. He could not tell when you were looking at him.
When he began discreetly pouring out his smoky tea into
the houseplants, they flourished as if you had spoken
to them every day for a year, given them pet names.

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