going to behave

caroline ganci patterson

bought the car to sleep in the car
slept in the car

till the snow made morning
out of the car

pissed in a puddle told my father my legs stretch
good now i only curl in the car

for warmth i like my hands between my thighs i like being
away totaled the car

and drove it another season swallowed whole did that to a lover too and he
laughed steamed gooded bled me in the car

his mother bought him let him take me to north carolina in the car where my hands
plucked his hair like they gassed the car

for that whole season he falls asleep inside me mutters caroline you’re curled
up your dirt my pet parking lot a toy car

The Yale Review · “going to behave” by caroline ganci patterson

how did this poem begin for you?

This poem began in a workshop with Adrienne Chung where she handed us simple nouns. Told us to write ghazals and repeat them. Let us undo them after. Forgo restriction. I got the word car. Same place where I had puked stroganoff in the back seat and rationalized away many lives. That year, I had devoted myself to a restrictive sonnet series; this poem broke that. As if I needed permission.

caroline ganci patterson lives in Missoula, Montana. Their debut manuscript, brat olympics, was a 2025 finalist for the Michael Waters Poetry Prize and Barrow Street Poetry Prize. They intern with Copper Canyon Press and teach a poetry class on questions.

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