I kissed you from the
dusty curb underneath
the guard rail.
How I ended up here,
I’ll run through my mind
over and over until I
trace it back to that bottle,
those glasses shining
from the fireplace mantle.
my mouth was full
of ink and everything
I pressed my lips on
remembered me
from class, or high school,
or the checkout line
at the grocery store.
I shift in my shoes.
I didn’t mean to write
all these stories
with my kisses.
you made a cheap promise
that you’d hold me when
the bulls started to run.
a fear of hooves. a fear
of rippling brown hides.
I have a memory
of leaning out
these windows,
watching the animals
take to the cobblestones.
I let my scarf flutter
down to the street.
It disappeared
in a rush of muscle.
everything was
reduced to thread.
oh, all these faint lights
under my bed?
those are the graces
for which people
forget to ask.
oh, this medal
hanging between
the freckles on my chest?
it’s just a skeleton
key to the afterlife.
an onion to bring into
the light. an onion to
summon the rain. an
onion to sleep in my
top drawer. an onion
to make it easier to cry.
an onion to make me
forget my hometown.
an onion to redden cheeks.
an onion to swerve
the car off the road.
make the first cut.
perhaps there is another kind
of peace. it lives further
than the bathwater can reach.
there are thousands of eyes
waiting on the other side
of the window.
you fog up the glass
with your mouth
so they can’t see in.
it is simpler than they know.
leave us be. we will tie up
our own ends as if they are
the loose threads of a quilt.
your neck is a phantom,
your bones are warmer
than I imagined.
this wheel is truth,
is beginning, is ending.
I filled your pillow with coins.
you left me a lock of your hair
on the windowsill, tied together
with the reddest ribbon.
there is a secret place
where we will meet again.
it is thick with moss. it is
covered with thread stretched
so tight. heaven knows I’d
cross the creek to make a bed
between the darkest pines.
on this motorbike,
I hold my hymnal
as if it was my first born.
we teeter dangerously close
to the bumpers of trucks,
towering baskets of chickens.
I close my eyes and imagine
that the spokes of this bike
catch the hem of my skirt,
send me sprawling into the street.
somewhere, my mother hears
me fall. somewhere, my bones
have shaken loose.
they burst into snow.
I found you to have
such an exquisite wit,
never coarse, always sparkling.
I also envisioned my love
for you as an anthill
in the crease of the sidewalk.
as all those tiny legs scurried home,
I kicked their house in.
in death, songs are different--
like hearing them from the
beginning of a tunnel,
from the light that comes
from elsewhere.
they slant off-key, lose their
balance on the stairs, get caught
in the lacy hems of their skirts.
when teeth hit the edge of a step,
that is a song in and of itself.
steam rushes out,
turns everything
to white.
you walked in
unannounced
and found me
singing to all
the animals.
their coats
buzzed and hummed
along with my song.
I fed them
sugar cubes
out of my
cupped hand.
they accepted
with pink tongues
and perked ears.
I offered you
a little white cube.
it melted
in your hand
before you reached
your mouth.
you build a thousand little houses
and I found myself alive
in all of them.
passing from one door
into the other, they felt like
chambers of the heart.
the blue dinnerplates
were lined up so neatly
on the shelves, while tissues
poked out of their boxes
at just the right angles.
the glass of water waiting
on the nightstand for me
was deeper than I ever imagined.
I fall asleep to the mantra
I can wait
I can wait
I can wait
as the first hail of the season
tackles the thin glass
of my window.
I get into bed in nothing
but a nightgown. The heater
clicks on in the middle of my dreams
and sets my whole world aflame.
when there is a mouth
that needs fed, take the jars
of dried marigold blossoms
and fill it.
each seed is an hour
badly spent.
these days,
I keep all my faults
in the woodshed
‘till winter.
I burn them
when I’m cold.
1
one night, my fingers
turned into skeleton keys.
I tried to open all
your doors.
my affection for you
now stands, knees knocked,
arm in a plaster white cast.
2
I played a song
just for you
on the radio.
I faltered when I held
the mic to my mouth,
stuttered my way through
names & titles.
3
I opened the oven
and my bread had turned
to roses.
the petals curled in the heat,
against the dead of winter.
still waters run deep
enough to drown in.
I let it all go--my breath
my nipped-in waist,
the curl that hung in front
of only my left ear.
the water was loud,
the depths were quiet,
the cattails lobbed their
heavy heads over in the wind.
there are good days
where I look like myself.
there are bad days
where I come back confused,
claiming to be changed,
convinced that this birthmark
is just a shadow.
the earth leaned towards me
on its wiry axis and counted
each and every thing
I am currently
doing wrong.
I told it I wanted to be
an empty store front,
a sill of chipping paint,
a pigeon hunched
on the rungs of a ladder.
we lie awake. we count
the glasses of water
that line the nightstand,
leave rings behind.
I was worried that
my lungs had fallen out.
I shook you. I opened
your mouth with my fingers.
you peered into my chest
with golden binoculars
and assured me that everything
was in tact. pulsing. breathing.
without you,
I have not a penny
under the sun
to leave anyone.
on the other side
of the window,
the neighbor boy runs
down the street, trailing
a jump rope behind him.
nowadays the world
is lit by lightning.
forget the way
everything looks
from the vineyard--
all iced-over, glassy
beads of fruit.
we overlook
the lake in silence.
I drove out here
to tell you something.
I drove out here
to sing and not
be heard.
in the back of that
wide cadillac, you took
all the apples from the kitchen
along for the ride.
I am not made of machines
or gears that wind in the night,
but the stuff that drowns
in little swimming pools
of light.
you left, took my fruits
with you, held down the horn
and like a storm, you rolled out
of this town. I asked you to
wave goodbye, or hello--
just a wave.
you couldn’t even do that.
I was chased ‘till my heart
grew thin. the needles in
my lungs shook like a great pine
over a slumping roof.
with just a little more weight,
the whole thing will crush
my bed, these woven wicker baskets,
the blue bottles lining all the sills.
please come back, curl up in
my ribs. I don’t even remember
what my biggest fears are.
I stood at the foot
of the bed and told you
how great I thought you were--
how your arms were like
great silver bridge beams,
your legs like spiraling turrets.
in your cheeks, there must
be something that mimics
the sun.
when I was finished,
the deer standing outside
our window turned to glass.
