Pumpkin Seeds

Online, I see a story about a little boy who grew
pumpkins in his bathroom sink—his teeth
in the picture as small & white as tic tacs. A friend
tells me she misses innocence. & I miss
it too. I miss smiles like the boy’s. Smiles that say
tomorrow is another pear to juice.
At some point, I passed through a filter. No matter
how wide I open the aperture of my eyes, new pictures
develop grey. I never grew anything myself,
but my mother once dressed me as a jack-o’-lantern
& carried me from house to house on Halloween.
The boy tried to show his mother the first sprout—
small & waxen when it rose from the sink. I don’t
remember being a pumpkin, but I have pictures,
& pictures remember the light. As a child,
every stomachache was the worst pain I’d ever felt,
then I forgot it. I haven’t felt the worst pain
I’ll feel yet. The worst things are unavoidable.
My mother & father will die. My friends. Me.
When the flow of water stopped, then reversed,
crept up & over the porcelain brim, the boy’s mother
found his seedlings, their green grown deep
into the drain. The boy & I looked like them
until we breached the loam. When I stopped
growing, I collapsed under my own weight.

Lucas Jorgensen is a poet and educator from Cleveland, Ohio. He holds a BS from Florida State University and currently studies in the MFA program at New York University where he is a Goldwater Fellow and assistant poetry editor for Washington Square Review. His work has appeared in or is forthcoming from The Massachusetts Review, New Limestone Review, ellipses… literature & art, and others.