Love Poem 

Quit your job

Cancel the wedding

Abort that fetus

Come home with me

Brief Survey

1. How do you tell the difference between true love and pathological obsession?


2. Do you find this distinction easy to make?


3. Have you always?


4. Do you engage in sympathetic love magic (ie: sleeping with rose quartz under your pillow, texting at angel numbers)?


5. If so: what objects or rituals do you use?


6. If not: why not?


7. What is the most depraved non-sexual thing you have ever done for love?


8. What is the most depraved thing you would probably do?


9. Do you consider love
a.) hobby
b.) career
c.) holy war
d.) all of the above?

Gender Studies

When she lost, Judy Garland said that Grace Kelly fucked her way to an Oscar. How did she feel when Grace became a princess? Grace always looked so sad, and why? It was Judy who had to smile all the time, to swim through an ocean of barbiturates just to move the muscles in her face. Too bad Judy didn’t live to see Grace get fat, which she finally did, staying still so long inside her palace. To keep her weight down during Wizard of Oz, they made Judy smoke eighty cigarettes a day. And sing. And sing.







Nicola Maye Goldberg is the author of Other Women (Sad Spell Press, 2018), The Doll Factory (Dancing Girl Press, 2019), and Nothing Can Hurt You (Bloomsbury, 2020). She lives in New York City.