for some of us,
freedom was a legend;
a cage of smudged windows
and insatiable longing,
a crippled twirl    pace
around the apartment
with a wand in hand,
repetitive crescendo in head
or the sudden broken glass
on the porch
the

knot of fervent caterpillars
sliding through my guts and
prematurely spilling out onto the floor,
dissolving into pools of blood
like little girls ripped in pieces
in the midst of a tornado’s whirl
when they should have hid in the cellar,
waited patiently,
incubated like their wild brothers
anchoring in the moisture of a soft,
hemorrhaging sarcophagus
before they soar;
destroy their cotton packages
and hatch into thin air.
when the day is finally warm
and facing them, they
tear through the tether
unbridled in
unimpeded exodus
to transform into grand ideas
and take off without interruption
like the little girl’s
scorn; now grown,
an envoy of acrimony
and the blue-black tones of
home.

and I pause here to ask myself
before I commit to the
flight,:
what does metamorphosis
feel like?    my skin
tearing at the thread of
each inside, each wound
and stretching wide
for me to see,    wide
enough to case the sky
 and black inside turned
outside;  now
black each wing of
bone and
vine.

5.

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you gave me a bouquet of
weeds once as I was drinking
my third cup of coffee.
you had picked them from
our backyard when I wasn’t
looking.

you were smiling with teeth;
big, and I loved
 you.
following that the day was not as
pristine or worthy of
photographic memory,
 but I don’t
always choose what stays,
what goes, what lingers
in between the building of
new thoughts, the removal
of the old, the magic it
all makes.

I had changed into a sundress
and walked down the stairs
slowly because I had bent over
 in a way that tore something
 inside of me:
a nerve or muscle.
I mustered up enough breath
to say it feels like I pinched a nerve
and am having trouble breathing.
what should I do?

you had to be somewhere
soon, I knew.
you looked up the staircase
 on your way out
the front door and
simply said: I don’t believe you.
someone else drove me to
the doctor and that doctor
confirmed I strained my back,
 prescribed me Flexeril
 for the pain and wrote me
a note explaining to my internship
why I wouldn’t be in that day.
I laid in bed, waiting for the
drugs to subside.

you came home
and attempted to justify
why you always felt
deceived by me.
I lay numb,
relieved
of feeling anything as you recited
everything I’d ever done
that bothered you.
you weren’t sorry,
it’s Thursday, and I feel
nothing for you
now.

“Thursday”

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I was giving her a shower.
I’m there for two hours to help with
personal care:

make sure she brushes her teeth,
settles down with a word search,
remind her it’s Tuesday.
after towel drying her so they could put on the
hemorrhoid cream,
I handed her a comb
and began rubbing lotion over her legs;
smooth like a child’s
the veins were still tucked behind flesh:
invisible with a firm,
earned elasticity.

you must have taken good care of yourself.

I enjoyed rubbing them.
years of tall glasses of water
running through those hidden blue streams
electrifying her cells,
tightening the gaps that so many of us
 have       she chose
crackers with avocado instead of Nutella,
early retirement on fluffy pillows,
watching the dawn cut the sky,
flossing,
deadlines and
filing nails.
she was just so full of tranquility,
days worth spending,
assets,
responsible parables,
a mother who taught her how to bake bread ,
crack eggs and iron hems.
 she contemplated and said:

I like your dark eyes.

pacing the harbor with a flask
and a plan to really “do it this time,”
a hoard of sycophantic worker bees
who show me what their insides look like,
sleepy evenings that end in the bottom of
everyone, mislaid plays written in
 spilled finger paint,
sprinkles of tobacco on the seat,
thirsty kidneys,
a camouflaged abuse that taught me how to
 cower at words, a man’s
love and
bedroom hair that screams,
 cries that  freeze beneath my cheeks
before they learn to creak
turn to moans
melt on tongues
when touched in heat.

my eyelashes hurt.
my wrists feel like stone.
my spine is crooked like
the broken flute they cracked
out of temper when I wouldn’t
play  the right way but
my legs are tall, ancient
and rough like
sequoias; uprooting and
walking forward.
it’s day and I’m awake
but my head is full
of horror.
I face her,
southern and
polite and
touch her shoulder

thank you.

still so full of
nights.

“eyes”

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all day long
I vacillate between intention
and immediate withdrawal;
between discussion of habits,
intentions, expectations
 and
smashing my fist into a
mirror to feel the way
it might when I finally
say something again.

7.

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will you still lick my wounds
if I taste like someone else’s mother?

“the cradle”

0

 

“And you’re still addicted to way back when instead of
coming back to life.”

—Buddy Wakefield

there once was Boulder
and the flatirons draped in
summer sun.

I always had popsicles and
 chapstick on hand,
a wet coral lipgloss,
tantrums and suggestive tones
that my brother would make it through,
funerals and weddings and cherry-
stacked Shirley Temples;
 a lot of  murmurs
 from a  painful
you declaring your love for me
in the middle of the night in
the middle of my hometown
while I was drunk on my former losses
and no cocktail to hold.
then there was despondent me
taking it all in
with a wilted corsage in my hair

that I wanted to wear the next day
 but couldn’t wait
so bought it three days early and

                 never mind the water
my date called and
without twenty four hours notice,
stood me up.

you stood in.

we attended the wedding the next day;
on the anniversary of our trip across country.
I wore a peach vintage dress and tied a
ribbon in my hair instead of
 the dehydrated orchid.
you brought me a headband and a bracelet to match,
said some dulcified things about my progress
and recovery, apologies about my brother
 and you hoped my mom would be ok,
a little postcard that said “Ghent”
 to remind where I came from
and a note on the back to remind me
where I’ve been.
to your credit,
I never said it,
            (mostly self seeking back then)
we had it.

I never appreciated much
until I moved here and was
left in a townhouse on the
edge of Lehigh
and these days,
I appreciate just a little bit of sun
through the mirror of clouds that frowns back
and the retreat of all the workers and corners
to their shelters somewhere barely safe,
a brief meditation on my mattress,
enough money for dinner and
if I’m lucky, a nap
 in the middle of the day where I lay
letting the thoughts of us
 running to the west and unlocking fingers
 to each discover it
in our own way
wash over me
to the sound of
          forgive the sudden bird chirps
mostly silent days.

and we had it
so I know it happens.

“liberation”

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as if I am even hurting anything;
some embittered tremulous
thing shaking her fist at the
moon and praying for a tidal
wave.

you notice the notch in my veins
before you even notice
 the rain.

“flood”

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to the all the women scorned and
walking forward, this is for
you:
women are animals.
women are animals.
women are animals.
women are animals.
women are animals.
women are animals.
women are animals.
women are animals.

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