"Midnight Snacks" and Hail Mary 

1.
Tell your mother you need a "Midnight Snack"
even though both of you know you
aren't hungry--
2.
Hungry: feeling or displaying the need for food--
we were hungry for the crisp edges of night 
scraped from a burnt cookie sheet and
laid to rest on a plate
like shingles toppling from the 
roof in the winter-- I can still hear
my father's footsteps up there
and I know we're all sleeping.
3.
Night is hungry.
4.
Pillows remind you of the flat
faces of pancakes-- cheeks
of your baby brother. He was
unexpected and blueberry.
Brothers make bad Christmas presents
and they don't like sleep.
5.
Did you say your prayers?
6.
Did you think of the saint statues
in the cube on the shelf--
how they always watched you from
just far enough a distance to be
goddesses-- do you believe
in goddesses?
Do you believe in book shelves?
7.
Hungry: having a strong desire or craving--
like how we wanted to feel night 
as easy as skim milk--
Milano cookies and
counter crumbles-- my mother
taught me to soak cookies in skim milk
as a way of waiting
for night to close our eyes-- she withheld 
herself from all of us-- distant
like our shelf goddesses in 
bloody and cookie crumb feet--
8.
I cut myself out like a blondie
square and gnawed on the edges
slow to remain at the counter--
it was the only thing separating us
between the company of saints 
and the cold skim milk behind my eyes--
9.
Our father who art in heaven--
No! I want to say a hail Mary because
Saint Mary stays up with me from the bookshelf
with the snakes burn under her toes.
10.
They cut off Saint Catherine's
head and it only bled milk.
I wonder how they slept that night.
I wonder if they ever drank milk
again.
11.
My father throws shingles past the window 
of my bed room.
12.
My father takes apart the roof
so that the house can flow easily
into the sky
13.
My father prayers to Saint Michael--
the who who burned the Devil
from the edges of a cookie sheet
14.
I never understood Saint Michael
15.
I think Saint Michael lost
because we still can't sleep and we 
still have the devil and Saint Catherine's
neck still bled milk-- it's easy
enough to fight the Devil if you're 
an angle but what about a saint statue
on a book shelf?
16. 
We break the last mint Milano cookie
like Eucharist-- this is my body--
do this in memory of sleep-- 
dip me in milk and drink and forget
about Saint Catherine--
17.
There is no roof
18.
Hungry: causing hunger
19.
A hunger for counter and your mother
and not wanting to say good bye
20.
My father opened the roof
so we didn't have to go into
the night each alone.
21.
My brother was always the first asleep
and sometimes I still forget I have two
22.
Saint Mary is tired of burning 
snakes for me. Saint Catherine was just executed 
again and my mother is asleep in the 
rocking chair.
23.
I can still hear my father's foot steps
on the roof and we don't have a roof.
24.
The Devil is scared of Saint Mary
25.
Hail Mary full of Grace 
Hail Mary who severed the space
between my eyes and the cold
skim milk beneath them--
Hail Mary who scrapes evil from
cookie sheets and puts back on Saint
Catherine's head and reminds my
father that our fathers aren't always
in heaven
Hail Mary who stay up all night--
cutting us out like blondies and 
putting the shingles back on the roof.