“Otherwise Fallin in Love” Song by Les Rallizes Dénudés

summer air catches people outside
hugs them in humidity and gnats:
spring in florida

a guy i used to make out with—
stare at his ceiling and movie posters
when he choked me
my head light on his couch pillow—
sends me a song

a towel tied tight over my hair
i fall back on my bed
look through the ceiling
dream of his record player and
the hard pasta he made me
“it’s al dente,” he said

stuff away the memory of longing
for someone else when wrapped in his bedsheets
crying (and drunk)
calling my dad to pick me up
walking to the car with records i’d brought

i run my tongue over my teeth to know
they are still there
to feel them smooth and bite my tongue at its tip
then push it to the insides of my cheeks

until i am with him in chicago
trudging through snow and slow drums
the killer guitar solo bleeding
all through the eight minutes

By Hadley Hendrix

Biography:

I am the Fiction Editor at Talon Review and am currently studying Psychology of Fiction at the University of North Florida. I intend to become a book editor, literary agent, or something else in the world of publishing I may fall in love with along the way. I strive to write stories and poems that eat at life and leave readers with its seeds, the pulp sticking to the sides of an empty glass. Before joining the staff, my work has previously been published in Talon Review, alongside other publications, including Élan International Literary Magazine and Scholastic.