In this dream, I have been asked
to speak at your wedding.

I am wearing an asymmetrical dress
and this is how I know I am dreaming.

When I stand to give my speech,
everyone at the reception stares blankly

at my exposed shoulder until I notice
the barnacle (the size of a teacup) growing

from my collar. There are bundles
of fish hanging from the chandeliers

like metallic earrings. I can smell
their death as new and close

as fresh, cut grass. When I try to say
how happy I am for both of you

minnows spill from my mouth, hundreds
of slippery lies making a wet, slapping sound

on the banquet table. I sit, ashamed
of this mess I’ve made. Someone hands me

a conch shell. When I hold it to my ear,
I can hear your lovemaking,

the sound of your bodies breaking.

- Sierra DeMulder

My cousin and I lay on a futon.
I am seven. Our unshaven calves
are touching, soft as milkweed.
Her hands are cupped between her legs,
holding a trapped moth. I ask her why
her hands are there.

—

I am thirteen. In the bathtub,
I scoot my hips up against drain
and drop my head back like a baptism.
When the water gets too high, I empty
it again and again.

—

Shitty erotica on the computer.
My eyes skim the paragraph for the good
words: cock, thrust, moan, wet.

—

Hey, I didn’t know you’d be home so early.

—

I imagine his face between my legs.
There are people talking loudly
in the other room and I’ve got work
to do but his face is between
my legs and his fingers
are growing into my hips
and my fingers become his
tongue, oh god, and his tongue,
his tongue, his tongue is
a lonesome valley, his tongue
is the last prayer for rain.
I say my own name in a whisper.

—

Sumedha, a four-year-old
Indian girl with thick, oil-spill hair
is supposed to be asleep
on her cot at the daycare
where I work. It is nap time
and she is laying on her stomach,
her hands buried, her tiny pelvis
trying to find a rhythm
her body does not know yet.


- Sierra DeMulder

Real quick, click here for the SUNY Geneseo Facebook event page. Tomorrow! 9pm! Come meet my dad!

So I’m off, traveling for three months of shows. Life on the road definitely wears on me. I am always in public and rarely alone. The bus/train/plane leaves early and the shows run late. That being said, I am always extremely grateful for this opportunity and SO thankful for every stage, microphone, and audience member. This time around, I’ve thought a lot about what could help me stay happy and healthy. Here are THREE I’ve come up with:

1. DANCE AT GAY BARS - Not only is dancing a great workout, it is a stress-reliever. I don’t enjoy dancing at non-gay friendly clubs because I’m there to have fun and dance in my own personal bubble, not feel like I’m on an episode of a National Geographic show on predators. 

2. SHOP AT GROCERY STORES - Eating at truck stops, fast food joints and vending machines gets real old real fast. Don’t get me wrong. I have a killer sweet tooth. I love salt and feel like I personally discovered butter in 2007. But more importantly, I love fruits, raw veggies and home-cooked meals. I’m even contemplating going vegetarian for the next couple months just for the mental reminder to be conscious of what I eat. 

3. CALL HOME - It’s really easy to get caught up in what is around me. I want my loved ones to know that I miss them and am thinking about them, because I always am. I just forget to show it all the time.

Any suggestions for more tour goals?

I’ll be adding a few shows here and there, but I will keep everyone posted. March, April and May schedules are on the way. Reblog! Invite your friends! Will I be seeing YOU next month??

February 8th:
Cantab Poetry Slam
738 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, MA - 8pm

February 9th:
Loser Slam
Inkwell Coffee House
655 Second Avenue
Long Branch, NJ - 9pm

February 10th:
SUNY Geneseo
TBA Geneseo, NY - 9pm

February 13th:
York College of PA
Sparts Den
441 Country Club Road
York, PA - 7pm

February 16th:
Troy-Buchanan High School Writer’s Week
Troy, Missouri - Private

February 19th:
Uptown Poetry Slam
Green Mill Jazz Club
4802 N. Broadway Ave.
Chicago, IL - 7pm

February 20th:
Mental Graffiti
Cole’s Bar
2338 N Milwaukee Ave
Chicago, IL - 7:30pm

February 22nd:
In One Ear
Heartland Cafe
7000 N Glenwood Ave
Chicago, IL - 9:00pm

February 27th:
Fremd High School Writer’s Week
Palatine, IL - Private

February 28th:
Berklee College of Music
Berklee Poetry Slam
Room 110 of 7 Haviland Street
Boston, MA - 7:30

February 29th:
Sarah Lawrence College
TBA
Yonkers, NY - TBA

February 30th:
JUST KIDDING IT DOESN’T EXIST!

So here is the dealio: my second book is being released by Write Bloody Publishing at the end of January. I am extremely proud of this book and all the hard work I put into it. I can honestly say that I evolved during the writing process and that is one of the most rewarding feelings I have ever felt as an artist.

Sierra, what does this have to do with me? I’ll tell you. This book is very different from my first (in good ways, I assure you) and I wanted the chance to talk about it with y’all first. But me talking about just my book is boring, no?

So, ask me a question. It can be about my writing process, my book title, my preferred footwear, my favorite poets, anything. It will be like a weird, online truth or dare game, without the dare and teen-angst. I am going to collect my favorite questions and answer all your curiosities in a youtube video, as well as talk about exciting details about my book! Sound good? Any questions? I hope so…

Find the ask button on my tumblr page, facebook message me or email me at sierrademulder@gmail.com. Thanks! xo Sierra

Don’t worry. The acne will go away, sort of. 
You will stop fighting with your sisters. This will be
because of two things: your inability

to steal their clothing and the realization 
that they are older, cooler versions of you. Your bully 
will end up shaving her head and going to jail

or she will become a lawyer and have a nice car 
and six babies. You will have no idea. You will forget 
what she looks like, remember her the way 

one remembers a splinter. You will stop 
loving sharp things. You will learn how to make 
your bed without being forced or threatened.

You will break up with your high school 
sweetheart. I know this is a surprise 
but trust me. It is the right thing.

Yes, he loves you but it is a smothering love,
the way a dog nurses an open wound, all bared teeth
and tongues. When you leave him,

it will not feel like crushing a light bulb
in your hand — more like slowly, so slowly
removing glass from inside your palm.

For years after him, you will let your heart
hang open like a soup kitchen. This is not 
a bad thing, more a lesson in proportions. 

After graduation, you will change a hundred 
times over, like a revolving door, a waterfall. 
One day, you will learn how to give 

and receive love like an open window 
and it will feel like summer every day. 
One day, everything will make sense. 

- Sierra DeMulder

After the divorce, my mother moved
from the house I was born in, the one
my father built by hand from lumber

he cut and stripped and varnished. 
The kitchen in her new home is small 
and brown, constructed from fake

wood, plastic cupboards painted
to look like grain, like it once breathed
and swayed. Her kitchen does not

breathe. The dishes match, something
I can tell comforts my mother: the woman 
who wore daisies in her hair

on her wedding day. The quilter who
does not waste, who uses every last scrap
of fabric, who is too practical to throw away

a mismatched fork. The orphaned tools
seem to crowd the silverware drawer, 
suffocating like clipped daisies out of water. 

- Sierra DeMulder 

For Kyle
www.guante.info

The emcee does not make eye contact.
He raps facing the speakers. His left side,
his good side, in profile, a portrait

of a dead president. He grips
the microphone like a teenager
jerking off to a jumbled porno.

He speaks to the beat, telling it
how to keep its shit together.
The audience is staring at him

but not really watching. The audience
is nodding their heads but they aren’t smiling.
They aren’t dancing or clapping or weeping.

They are just nodding their heads
and he is holding the microphone
not like a cock but like this is

the kind of pleasure that hurts.
Like this is the last thing his grandfather
said before unplugging himself.

Like this is the hottest pepper picked
from the vine with his teeth. Like he is hurting
himself for this.  This is the chorus he woke up

choking on. This is American dream:
to scream at the deaf. This is the most
romantic stroke. His whole left side is numb,

just nodding their heads.

- Sierra DeMulder