10 Things

your heart is swollen to make your breasts appear larger

and flowers have more colors, even the dying ones
and some mornings, you see him across the room
and some mornings, perfume bottles sit empty near the sink
and you drink more wine, less beer
and your hair curls on its own
and your tongue to him, “speak to me in spanish, but only the dirty things”
and all of your dresses have big blooming wild flower prints
and they sit above the knee
and then you learn to write poetry with your tongue on his skin

for sale.

if you have fifteen dollars
i can sell you a list like this one
but more beautiful,
and for twenty, i can write your name
into the title
i’ll sell you a list that isn’t like this list
at all:
the muscle ache of the clock hands
the tooth ache of the tiger
and the noise our molars make
when our jawbone shifts
the soft groan of our tongues
the bell over the door of the liquor store
the junk that collects at the backs of our throats
a cockroach bed frame
the bones of our fingers snapping together
in time with your favorite song
for fifteen or twenty, i’ll sell you a list
like this one,
but it will be yours
to keep

smear.

the only galaxies
i’ve ever seen
are the insects
smeared across
the windshield
green and black
with bug-eyed
moons catching
the streetlights
and speckled legs
caught in the motion
of freeway wind
they were quite
beautiful
and sticky
and so easy
to wash away

The way I read Poems is in tiny little spurts.
Poems on toast with half a sugared grapefruit.
A glass of orange juice, no pulp.

I read Poems in little bundles like nerve endings,
A Poem after I’ve brushed my teeth and
Pretended to floss.  These are spearmint Poems.

I’ll read a Poem between sending two emails
But never will I read a collection of Poems from beginning to the end.
They need time, Poems, to settle into my body.  And turn on a light.

I read a Poem on the train, traveling from New York
To Boston.  The woman behind me read the same Poem, too.
She didn’t tell me this.  I felt her reading it with me, over my shoulder.

At the airport I read a Poem inside a bathroom stall.
The Poem went this way, if I remember it right:
“Tina was here, she was on her knees but she wasn’t praying.”

I read a Poem each night before I fall asleep.  After I take a handful
Of pills.  Some nights the Poem keeps me awake, or it makes me
Dream vivid Poem dreams.  Last night the Poem made me sweat, swear.

I’ll read Poems in the rain walking home or
Poems in the waiting room.  Poems in subway stations that smell
Like urine (the station, not the Poem).  Poems on a plate next to tea.

Poems separated by a Classic Rock song or finger-snap.  Time between
Poems the length of a cigarette or letting the curling iron heat up. 
Time enough to allow each Poem to absorb itself entirely into my blood,

And rush quickly toward my heart.

Clorox.

I’m watching a butterfly dance drunk circles around the porch light, contemplating its markings, sipping beer with ice, chewing hang nails, waiting like a silly young thing for love to come find me, smelling the Clorox scent of the dryer vent, frowning all the while, at the butterfly.  Stupid thing, I think.  Stupid thing, you don’t know how beautiful we all think you are.  You only know nectar and bright spots of light.  Stupid mindless thing, so graceful with painted color, making us all look like bad, big dumb things down here while you drift so carelessly across the shadows the moon makes.  My beer is gone and my fingertips are bleeding.  The dryer has stopped running.  The butterfly nestles under the gutter and disappears leaving me alone again, a silly young thing, waiting for love to come find me.

bundle.

today
feels more like yesterday
wrapped inside tomorrow

seven years of twenty (27).

i suppose, by way of measurement
i have been twenty for seven years
twirling in a waving sea
of party balloons
and wilted streamers,
whiskey and bathwater and dinner wine
dead candles and wax fingertips

i suppose, by way of mathematics
i will die in three years
twisted and old in a glorious fire
of melting diamond rings
and unused ovaries,
eviction notices and rejection letters
dilated pupils and envy

i suppose, by way of nature
i will have done all of the things
that we’re meant to do in life
i was born, there was a middle
and now i’ll die
at thirty

fearophobic.

i fear extreme cold and deep water
solar flares and tight spaces,
hard water and whip lash
i feel that at any moment
i might be lifted in a hurricane
or splinter my tongue
on a popcicle stick,
terrified of sharp teeth
and stories without endings
so when you came to me
a blurry shadow on the ceiling,
from far beyond the dead
you were thinking i’d cower like a child
under mounds of blankets and prayers
and we both sat shocked
when i raised my eyes to blink at you
and welcomed you into my bed

i don’t want to cut my hair.
it tangles, weaves, splits but
i don’t want to cut my hair
it blinds and stabs at my eyes but
i don’t want to cut my hair
if i pile it up like a braided ladder
you could climb it to the moon
bring back shining hot rocks
covered in moon dust
bring back your boots, drenched in moon mud
i don’t want to cut my hair
i don’t want to cut my hair

Laughing Unaware.

She drank strawberry milk, liked the way the pink bubbles looked exploding at the end of her straw when she blew.  And when her mother told her, ‘stop that, silly bear’, she blew harder and the milk would leap from the glass and splatter tiny pink freckles across her nose and her cheeks, catch like blushed dew drops on her lashes.  Laughing with gold sunshine teeth, fake pearls from her mother’s trinket box.  Laughing with her little silver crucifix bouncing around her throat.  Laughing with baby pink bubbles like candy foam on her tongue.  Laughing unaware of the sugar, chewing at her blood. 

let’s leave the waving to the atlantic and kiss goodbye instead

Seven Years

for seven years
watching you glide around
on twig legs with grace
stepping softly on clouds
of pink taffeta, lace and pearl
you drew a smile onto my lips
pulling at their corners with cord
drew laughter from my throat
with syrup and honey
for seven years

white noise.

white noise is ticking clocks on ancient walls
and buzzing traffic 6 miles north
i drove the length of six slow-smoked cigarettes
down a freeway that was one giant crater of tire marks
and city garbage fly-aways
ended up parked crooked on a road on the outskirts of tragedy
in front of tattoo parlor, next to a pub where on tuesday nights
“girls drink 4 free” and the walls are paper wood paneled
white noise is a refrigerator compressor constantly running
and the disembodied cries of a long-dead baby boy
and to run from it
i drove for as long as it takes to play his favorite album all the way through
down an interstate that was four lanes wide and dipped into a valley
paved in loose gravel dyed with coal for color
ended up right back home again
proving the earth is round and my bones are magnetically charged
white noise is light bulb filament and the mewing of kittens
train whistles and foundations settling
humming bird wings rattling, our teeth tapping together when we kiss
white noise is our hearts beating fast and our toenails growing
blossoms opening on trees and car engines overheating
i drove for the length of half a tank of gas
and then stopped behind a mini mart to dig a needle into my arm
and fall asleep in the backseat
underneath the toxic humming of an artificial moon that said,
“regular, $3.49”  that said, “diesel, $3.74”
white noise is
an electric lullaby

Fingers.

My fingers are stained with trace amounts of habit. 

Yellowed with nicotine, reddened with chewed cuticles, bloody.
Ice blue with raised addicts veins, sea-coast grey with scar tissue.

Thick with mildew from clinging to the old floral shower curtain.
Slick with semen webbed between each digit.  Green halos at their bases from fake silver, faker gold.

Purple with fingernail-dug bruises.  Deeper purple from the lack of flowing blood, the cold.

And they’re making it really hard to hold onto much of anything, anymore.