i got you flowers


i have made

a plan to cut & lift the skin

of my arm


to plant a bed

of daises within me


eventually: white petals will sprout out of my arm i will flower

for you

find each blossom

in my appendage’s arm


essentially: when i am with you the clouds are in me


& the rain comes from within me from the ground of my garden

fighting gravity to lift its droplets

up and out of my marrow


& to the daises seeing

their first shard of sunlight


all of the colors are there in my arm

where the dirt & blood mix

to resolve the progression


to make a florist out of me




blinks


i cry

because i am on earth

and in heaven there is no earth and no heaven


*blink* 


& @

the airport

TSA

finds the blade in my pocket the metal

made of my longing

4 u


*blink*


i remember your breath as it was

a flamingo in love


*blink*


wrap me in a sheet

& place me at the edge of the woods

i am in love with you a ghost in search

of your shape


*blink*


lay me in the brook 

the water as my pillow 

your touch 

my tomorrow


*blink*


walk on my chest i will protect

you from the broken glass below us


*blink*


our love would be much better if our bodies lasted forever




sky prism


please stand clear

of the closing desperation


a cloud knows

when to leak

nature is good

like that


embrace

the eventual invisibility

of your journey


plastic was once

innovative

& fossil fuel

revolutionary


forgive me if I'm not

an entire rainbow

life gives and takes

the color

as it pleases


better to have broken

than to continue

incomplete


I want the smoke

fire is my ancestral memory

Copyright © 2025 Otis Nebula Press. All rights reserved.

M.G. Martin grew up on Hawaiʻi island in the town of Waimea. He currently works as a high school administrator on the island of Maui. M.G. is the author of U U O U (Cyberwit, 2020) and One For None (Ink., 2010), and has performed on stages in San Francisco, Oakland, Los Angeles, San Diego, Portland, Boston, New York City, Seoul, and Honolulu. His poems have appeared in TinfishZYZZYVA, JukedPANK, and Bamboo Ridge, among others. M.G. has also led writing workshops for the Red Cross, the Hawaii Council for the Humanities, and was a 2018-19 W.S. Merwin Creative Teaching Fellow. You can find him online at mgmartin.ink.