everyday nostalgia
Allison Noonan | Poetry, Summer 2025
i like the summer mornings deep into late july
where everything still feels possible.
hot breath tastes like wanting more
and getting it. the air is sticky and balmy,
cicadas provide a bottom line buzz to the birds
singing for worms. the sun on my face distorted in the blue water,
gold and harsh in the earliness.
i want to bring you to this moment,
so we can drink sweet wine with strawberry aftertaste,
eat bread with thick crust, butter, and goat’s cheese.
i want to feed you grapes, your head in my lap.
feel your skin prickle with hot numbness under the midday sun.
i want to lay on a scratchy blanket by the lake
well into evening, feeling pine needles poke my spine,
tingling against the light breeze.
i want to ride on your handlebars to the gas station a block over,
grab a six pack of cheap beer,
a lighter, bag of cool ranch doritos, reese’s,
and a raspberry tea.
get back in time to be pulled closer to you;
just to watch the sun set over cool water,
hues of purple and blue––
nothing grand.
just a regular end
to a regular day.
______________________________________
Why is this piece your Trace Fossil?
“This piece is my Trace Fossil because it covers a lot of what I set out to do with my work, which is to capture the “blink and you’ll miss them” moments of everyday life and romanticize them. I think in doing so, it makes me cherish the “mundanity” a bit more, and I hope it resonates to others out there.”
Allison Noonan is primarily a poet who lives in the deep south of Georgia. Her work has been previously published in Oakland Arts Review and The Quarterly. She writes about the mundanity of everyday life with elements of the gothic and surreal.
everyday nostalgia
Allison Noonan | Poetry, Summer 2025
i like the summer mornings deep into late july
where everything still feels possible.
hot breath tastes like wanting more
and getting it. the air is sticky and balmy,
cicadas provide a bottom line buzz to the birds
singing for worms. the sun on my face distorted in the blue water,
gold and harsh in the earliness.
i want to bring you to this moment,
so we can drink sweet wine with strawberry aftertaste,
eat bread with thick crust, butter, and goat’s cheese.
i want to feed you grapes, your head in my lap.
feel your skin prickle with hot numbness under the midday sun.
i want to lay on a scratchy blanket by the lake
well into evening, feeling pine needles poke my spine,
tingling against the light breeze.
i want to ride on your handlebars to the gas station a block over,
grab a six pack of cheap beer,
a lighter, bag of cool ranch doritos, reese’s,
and a raspberry tea.
get back in time to be pulled closer to you;
just to watch the sun set over cool water,
hues of purple and blue––
nothing grand.
just a regular end
to a regular day.
__________________________________________
Why is this piece your Trace Fossil?
“This piece is my Trace Fossil because it covers a lot of what I set out to do with my work, which is to capture the “blink and you’ll miss them” moments of everyday life and romanticize them. I think in doing so, it makes me cherish the “mundanity” a bit more, and I hope it resonates to others out there.”
Allison Noonan is primarily a poet who lives in the deep south of Georgia. Her work has been previously published in Oakland Arts Review and The Quarterly. She writes about the mundanity of everyday life with elements of the gothic and surreal.
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