JULIE KLEAVER - POEMS

Julie Kleaver is a creative writing student precariously placed in  Southeastern Pennsylvania. She has been writing poetry for 3 years and is currently working on a collection. Her poems mainly focus on events that have happened to or inspire her. She has a fascination with the concept of youth that works its way into a lot of her work. While her poems are rarely about nature, she has an immense love of the outdoors. In fact, her prized possession is a mini cactus that she bought from longwood gardens in 4th grade that she has somehow kept alive. His name is steve and so far he has bore her 2 beautiful cactus children named Barn-Stomp and Lil’ Acorn.

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Summer slump
​

​Sweat turns to napalm
Everpresent and agonizing
Sink your body
Further into the earth
Secede to my cancer
I viciously scrub
Milky white thighs turned violet
Why do you love me like this?
Do you ever wonder
If the parasite inside her is dying?
Does her own liquor
Deflate its fertile torso?
Floating in your bed
As if she is on an ocean
Waves crash to portraits of me
Not sure
But
Dead mobility is evident
 

My Youth Spills Onto the Bathroom Floor
​

​There’s room for me and all my friends in the bathtub
Water turns to wine as it washes down the drain
Lost time and baby teeth trickle through the pipes
And into the sewer.
 

July 29, 2017
​

​The murky pool swallows our legs hungrily
And we surrender with great fervor
The water cleanses our bodies of childhood
Like some form of rebellious baptism
I submerge myself below
So I cannot hear the playful jeers
Freezing purity envelops me
I listen for my heartbeat in my ears
Remind me that I’m alive
Assure me that I am not just
The fruit loop flavored vodka coursing through my veins
And the fresh tattoo on my waistline
We hurry back inside
Undress before the cotton candy fiberglass
Trade her clothes for my own
Every thread lays itself to sleep on my shoulders
It’s almost as if all summer has led to this
In May you told me you loved him
And I’ve missed your skin ever since
 

I Wonder if Judas’ Kiss Tasted Like Cherry Cough Drops Too
​

​in another universe
metaphysical plane
I'd like to think
she and I
would be the best of friends
hell
even lovers

yet she stands
in an unfortunate place
in the vastness of us
a leaking flood gate
keeping shy smiles
away from open mouth kisses

i feel a tug in my stomach
as I will her out of existence
so that my mind can hold you

disobeying every rule
I so carefully weaved
into the platform
of where I plant my feet

if i was a better woman
I would build hers as well
instead of ripping it
out from under her
I grimace under the weight
of what I've done

the flood gate wobbles
screaming out
we draw near and
The lips of judas
are mine and mine alone
and in them
she can taste
cherry
sickly sweet
and the faintest hint
of you


 

Heart Murmurs
​

​why do you whisper
such terrible things
into my mouth
as if i cannot hear them
as if I just swallow them down
and they don't get lodged
dutifully perched
between the third or fourth rib