When a stranger from Bumble texts me twice in an hour

By Caroline Hayduk

I think

you are too lonely

I can’t make that quantifier—too— 

though I ask

have you forgotten 

an elbow against you

your teeth bleeding when brushing them

twice in a row

the waiter watching you

 over cold fries 

Lonely— 

running your fingers over dents

from tenants past

as if it is the metal wheel of a

 rotary phone

 you touch these strange digits

til your finger’s pink

driving—long drives to the place he

rented years ago 

to see if the porch is decorated

once,

empty beer cans were snow at your feet

surely you are naked

draped in your grandmother’s silk scarfs

your hair in her bouffant 

counting backwards

too lonely—I say—like I have the right

About the Author

Caroline Hayduk is a queer poet and editor who is interested in the weird and possibly dangerous places we go in poetry. She has an MA and MFA in Poetry/Creative Writing from Wilkes University. She has been published in The Penn Review, South Florida Poetry Journal, Santa Fe Writers Project and others. Night Bones, her debut chapbook, was published by UnCollected Press in 2024. She works in the Marketing Communications Department as a Content Specialist and lives in Scranton, Pennsylvania with her partner and two silly cats.