ERIN LITTLE
Sonnet for Queer Longing
We walk down St. Charles late one night after the parades.
Street sweepers are out, their open maws rake in go-cups,
beads, sludge. It’s 4am and we are so very eighteen, wobbling
on cheap heels around potholes of green wetness.
You ask for my definition of love and I take a block to think.
We’re still in it, cross-legged on the bed, barreling through yawn
after—my roommate’s voice after saying, “You light up around
her.” Thoughts accrue like weeds with oak tree
mothers who live centuries in one sustained embrace.
Endless green canopy, flowering thatched roof. I disappear
the weeds, invasive species that they are. Zephyrs roll
off the Mississippi, dead leaves ride the gust. My roommate drops
the subject. Next Mardi Gras I will drink less,
wear better shoes, walk home alone.
Erin Little is a writer and editor from Dallas, Texas. After graduating with a B.A. in English from Loyola University New Orleans in 2015, she moved to New York to pursue a career in publishing. Over six years Erin worked as an editorial assistant for Columbia University Press, Routledge Research, and Penguin Random House. She will graduate with an MFA in creative writing from Louisiana State University in 2024. Her poems and essays have appeared in Chestnut Review, Hobart After Dark, Juxtaprose Magazine, New Orleans Review, Prelude Magazine, The Shore, and trampset. Find her online @little__erin.