David Ly
Florence
And I’m picking up from where we left off
last night, each lyric illuminating on
the phone screen: a grimoire I recite from on
dark November mornings. Your choral
howls soothe the specters scraping against
my skull. Did I forget to take my headache
pill last night? On this particular morning
I’m not falling as hard, but still wonder
how my world would have rippled if I was
found at the end of love. Maybe it would
have been lighter, something that I can’t
quite imagine inhabiting now, now that
your spells wrap around me. I’m safe and
tethered here for a rest, no more drifting on
some pacific wind without stopping at all.
Is there a proper way to stop? Or is it okay
to say each lyric reaching in the dark lights
a way to live through the end with love?
Author’s note: This poem is inspired by and references song titles and lyrics written and performed by Florence + The Machine.
David Ly reads “Florence”
David Ly is the author of Mythical Man (Anstruther Books, 2020) and Dream of Me as Water (Anstruther Books, 2022), both short-listed for ReLit Poetry Awards. He is also co-editor (with Daniel Zomparelli) of Queer Little Nightmares: An Anthology of Monstrous Fiction and Poetry (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2022). David’s debut novel, Not All Dragons, is forthcoming with Poplar Press in 2026.