Tail tucked tight, a tremor in my fur,
One man
One woman
And I’m the second.
You fill my cracked heart with golden tender tones, smooth the sharp.
Then place me in your pocket, to circle with your thumb in hiding.
I lay here.
Glass and silicone facsimiles resting in boxes under my bed.
Blanket warmth and releasing tears for comfort.
I curl around my pillow and wait for you to pick me up.
The Communists were going to drop bombs on us;
that was not a matter of debate, only of timing.
I wondered why no one talked much about those bombs
we had dropped, or about the children who had been seen
fleeing that awful light
and how they were nothing now
but ghostly forms
on the walls of Hiroshima.
But I knew better than to bring that up.
Instead, I would sit quietly and Mama would read aloud,
again, the Official Rules and Regulations for a Bomb Shelter;
it sounded a lot like something Mama would have written;
she was good at rules and at getting ready
for disasters; and so we fixed up the cellar
under the house, dark and cold,
and we filled it up with Spam and white beans and
slimy canned spinach.
There would be room for only the three of us,
Mama said; all the poor cats and Bootsy,
our shaggy pet collie, and, of course, the neighbors
would have to fend for themselves
against the inevitable.
It did not seem like a kind of life I wanted to live; and so
as Mama read and talked and went about her preparations,
I would go over in my mind
my own simple plan:
When the sirens blared and the bombs were on the way,
I was going to run next door,
grab Mrs. Jessie Polson by the hand,
and together we would run as fast as we could
straight toward that light—
I walked last night within a dense forest,
its canopy hiding the stars,
thick trunks blocking the rising moon,
until I came to a glade, saw the North Star,
the moon’s ephemeral light, the woman.
You know how this story goes.
She was beautiful, so lovely,
that I fell to one knee, looking
directly into the eyes that looked
into mine while her lips smiled approval.
“Be my lover,” she asked and commanded.
There are many ways this story could end.
She was a witch, and laid a curse on me.
I held her in my arms while she slept,
and when she woke we held each other.
I was alone, but there were leaves,
the green oak leaves of the woods,
scattered on the floor, my bed.
I’m sure you can think of others,
heart warming or breaking, and so on.
Don’t think I haven’t thought of them all.
I’m sorry, so sorry, it was but a dream.
(after the circa-1940 painting by Sulamith Wulfing)
I hope you feel loved, hope you get home safe
a rainbow compresses and pours outside
park burping up all the glitter and lights
and at the intersection breaks apart
the grass is biting through my tights, I watch
hope that everyone can keep their joy,
safe in their colors, held by their lovers
they stand in groups, annoyed at frozen phones
an afterglow of fireworks, deep down they
know that they are back outside where hate thrives
a festering wound they fear stepping in
a wound love did not make, despite the claims
sleepy-eyed they dwindle, get rides, some walk
I hope you feel loved, hope you get home safe
Bartlett, Anjou, Bradford, Bosc,
all just fine as far as they go—
but nothing next to the pears
of my youth from Aunt Lila’s
gnarly old tree, their shapes
bulbous & homely, their thick skin
dark & mottled like a parchment
treasure map, their juice earthy
& ancient with a tang of rust.
I’d pull one down from a cloud
of wasps, gnaw it to the core
& pop even that in my mouth,
grind it with my teeth until
nothing was left but the seeds
I’d spit on the ground: my first brush
with a hunger beyond hunger,
a desire beyond desire. Then
I’d brave the yellowjackets again
& steal more pears, my sweet tooth
just as ravenous as theirs.
Conjure: double yellow sliver moons
transversing the horizon
the sacral spine of a sycamore
rattles the night sky,
the face of water knows
& throws light, pools shadows
a hummingbird’s tongue—
intention & absorption
a body thirsts, burns with questions
of bone, breath, plead, feel
vowels, a story of flow, lungs, lips
& throat, roots tunneling through soil
~ A found poem created from words in the poem “Prayer to the Charcoal Dusk” by Felicia Zamora
a wood bee buzzes in front
of your face and you flail
across your back stoop
breaking your wife’s clay
flower pots and bird feeders
and tchotchkes from your trips
to Asheville North Carolina
where everyone bites
their tongue and dips their toes
in artisan patchouli oil
and you knock a candle over
as you swipe at the bee
and a dry potted fern
catches fire and starts speaking
to you in riddles about
partisan politics and the smoke
is just thick enough to blind you
so that you step hard
into the wooden post that once
held your pergola, if only
you’d finished the job,
stupid bastard, one foot at a time.
from a hand-made sign
seen on a tattered recliner
left by the side of a street
I work
I can work
I am free
(almost)
I see
my friends
like me
go to work
It irks me
to see
those scenes
I see
me
in that chair
older
skin raw
at the arms
and footrest
I see
no rest
for me
I see
urgency
for me
I need
to invent
a new me
