The Trouble with Traveling Backwards

Your hair blows over
your ears into your eyes,
the punch line arrives
long before the joke,
the dog tears at the meat
then he begs—
your heart breaks
before you have a chance
to fall in love.









Sarah Kobrinskys poems and stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Magma Poetry, Jewish Quarterly (UK), Fjords Review, Shampoo Poetry, 100 Word Story, The Molotov Cocktail, Berkeley Fiction Review, among many others. She is the current Poet Laureate of the City of Emeryville, CA.