ADULT GROCERIES 

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Emily Marie Passos Duffy is the author of Hemorrhaging Want & Water (perennial press, 2023). She is a co-founder of Working Girls Press, a collaborative press dedicated to publishing and paying sex worker writers and artists. She lives in Lisbon with her orange cat and walks about 20,000 steps on a good day. You can receive monthly letters from her at duffylala.substack.com ︎

01.    Horse Girl




You call me late one night and ask if I can
Keep a secret


Of course. I’m already keeping mine.


I am listening to Nina Simone, knowing that the “other woman”
Is a construct designed to make women hate themselves


You ask me to rehearse what I’d say if a strange number called me
Asking who I am
And how do I know you


I would say, I’m not allowed to break
Patient confidentiality


Good, you say.


I ask, how much would I have to pay you to break my heart
To my delight, you say you’ll do it for free


There’s something you should know:


When I was young, I wanted a horse so bad
I’d wake up at dawn
And take a pitchfork to frozen compost in the backyard


I mucked an imaginary stall
Cracking the thin layer of frost over the pile like the fat
Bottom of a spoon to crème brûlée
My breath in clouds my knuckles white
I loved the idea of having a horse





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02.    Barnacle



Who hasn’t been guilty

of letting something go

On longer than it should have

Six years

Says the rugby player

As he cracks my back in private

He digs a hand in my scapula

And says “breathe”

I lean back

And he tells me about his divorce


I look at photos

Of us together

And my smile doesn’t

Reach my eyes


Branched anterior region

Network head of clinging

To the rock I left myself on


If not

In this lifetime

Maybe the next