Robert Wood Lynn
The Big Book of Little Frauds
This truck’s Check Engine light
that’s always on but lets us run okay.
How it wouldn’t pass inspection except
I know a guy.
Lawrence, who buys his beer alone in cases, always sure
to tell the clerk he’s getting folks together.
How my mother dresses up for Sunday errands—
keeps skipping church a secret between her and god.
How Lyuba makes me retake photos at a better angle
days later, sometimes weeks.
Or that thing she says I always do, saying I’m bad
to excuse myself from affection, its obligations.
The way the moon sometimes hangs out
all day like an echo. Like Lawrence on my stoop.
Sometimes we speak of everything
but this book, its contents.
I’ve loved so many people until they wanted a reason.
Robert Wood Lynn reads “The Big Book of Little Frauds”
Robert Wood Lynn is a writer from Virginia. His debut collection, Mothman Apologia, was selected by Rae Armantrout as the winner of the 2021 Yale Series of Younger Poets prize. His chapbook How to Maintain Eye Contact is forthcoming from Button Poetry in 2023. His work has been featured or is forthcoming in Ploughshares, Poetry Daily, The Southern Review, The Yale Review and other publications.