Katie Farris: And the Water Turned Over
Photo: Joanna C. Valente
A Dare from the Knight of Cups
When I stepped,
fully dressed,
into the bath,
he laughed
and stripped
away my thin
dress from my skin
with practiced precision.
A bit later, said he:
“Now this is sexy,
but this tub must be
heavy—
what if we
end up in
the kitchen?”
“Don’t worry,”
said I, executing
a neat turn
for which I am known,
and continuing:
“We’re still covered
under our home
warranty.” And so
my lover shuddered,
and the water
turned over
again
again.
The Magician Meets the High Priestess
“I’m designed
for alone;
a lighthouse,” I say,
his arms around
me, arabesques.
(His word; too
fluty for me.)
He shifts, adds
the flourish of his other
arm to my sans-
serif self, smiles
through my grump;
he joys me, reluctant, pulls
laughter,
that
redvioletorangecerulean
handkerchief,
slowly,
right
out of my
mouth.
Editor’s Note: These poems are part of our collection, Haunted: Tarot Poems
Katie Farris is the author of the hybrid-form text boysgirls, (Marick Press, 2011; Tupelo Press 2019) and the chapbooks Thirteen Intimacies (Fivehundred Places, 2017), and Mother Superior in Hell (Dancing Girl, 2019). Most recently she won the 2018 Anne Halley Poetry Prize and the 2017 Orison Anthology Prize in Fiction. Her work has appeared in literary journals including Poetry, The Believer, Verse, and The Massachusetts Review.
