A Horse Dehydrated

Leeor Margalit

This is what heartbreak is:
All around you, the bomb sirens whine their loud warning
and you are concerned only with the boy in front of you –
disheveled hair and sleepy eyes and he has just told you something
that he has never told anyone else.
That when he sees death, he can feel it in his side…
the side with the tattoo.

The next day, the two of us saw a sheep carcass
almost impossibly whole
as though she had lain peacefully to sleep
and had not woken up.
When I asked if he felt it in his tattoo,
he shook his head slowly.
It was as though because he told me about it,
because he had uttered the words aloud,
the magic disappeared.

The problem with confessing your love to someone on top of a mountain
is that you have to walk back down the mountain
even when he says he doesn’t love you back.
I knew that you could bring a horse to water
but you can’t make it drink.
Now I know that you can bring a man to tears, and to laughter,
and to tell you secrets, and to kiss you –
but you cannot make him want you.

Upon realizing this,
some small piece inside of me broke off and died
and all I wanted to do was ask him if he felt it in his tattoo.

Leeor Margalit (she/her) is a 23 year old Yemenite/Ashkenazi woman from southern California currently living in Israel. Her work has recently appeared in The Sutterville Review, As You Were: The Military Review, The Thing Itself, and Rigorous Magazine, among other publications. She enjoys reading, traveling, and photographing her friends and you can find her work on instagram @leeormargalitpoems.

Art: Why Do Fools Fall in Love by GJ Gillespie who is a collage artist living in a 1928 Tutor Revival farmhouse overlooking Oak Harbor on Whidbey Island (north of Seattle). In addition to natural beauty, he is inspired by art history — especially mid century abstract expressionism. The “Northwest Mystics” who produced haunting images from this region 60 years ago are favorites. Winner of 18 awards, his art has appeared in 55 shows and numerous publications. When he is not making art, he runs his company Leda Art Supply selling the sketchbook that he designed.