Oscillation

Madeline Menkes
→ BFA PT 2024

waves, obviously
periodic vacillation in space
with velocity, amplitude, and period (or frequency)
a sin curve

I think I am being haunted by texas instruments

three years later, of my own volition, returning to the

comfort of organizing the plot1

column into
rainbow order

follicular, ovulation, luteal
twice a month violently squeezing every pore in my face
for four hours

I read once the blackheads in my nose are sebaceous

filaments, completely normal and healthy and okay

I will still pick at them twice a month and contemplate urban sprawl,

terrified

my brother pointing and screaming about my armpit hair when we were 13. Terrified. Me laughing about his lack thereof four years later.

homesick, stir crazy, homesick,
craving

right after a rain
out the backseat car window
tiny glass fenestella house crescents of sunlight
they chase each other and I watch
spending commercial breaks dazed, unfocused
shifting to the blurring greenery in the periphery.

oh, and the chase begins again, there they go

I make—underscored by music, then podcasts, then audiobooks, then music

again, I think I get sick of things too quickly.
I think about grandparents I never knew
I think about my dad that I do know

I call my mom about him
I call my dad about her
I am an adolescent in this. And will be again.
anyway, I really have to pee.
bladder empties and fills

like waves, obviously.

I am gonna go now. But I’ve missed this. Will talk soon.

Madeline Menkes just cut her own bangs.