moselem springs

i'm filing for divorce.
no i don't hate him--
i just don't want to love like
that-- i want to love
like the brunch buffet
at moselem springs-- get
cheesecake stains on a lilac dress--
when i was eight i got communion. 
white-dress bride
like all the other girls--
we knew we were monsters
to be training to eat our god--
nervously we
gnawed on corn tortillas and 
sipped grape juice from 
timid plastic cups
in the vestibule of st. mary's--
what we didn't know was that
we were getting 
married--
our husbands on a cross--
neck crooked in agony--
isn't that what love is supposed
to look like?
cut yourself down to the width
of a wafer--
i was taught that if 
i didn't feel the stigmata then
i wasn't loving hard enough--
they crucified mary
more than once--
afterwards everyone 
congratulated me-- 
hung rosary medals around my
neck like a champion figure-skater--
what an accomplishment to
be big enough to eat
the skin of your father
and your lover-- 
he tasted like sand and ulcers--
afterwards we went to 
moselem springs-- a flat
little brunch buffet 
up the street and i remembered
still tasting blood in my 
mouth and wondering if it 
was my own or 
my new husband's
i wondered if we shared blood 
now and i checked
my palms front back
front back
front back
for the nail holes-- 
i beleived no 
one had something they'd let
themselves be crucified
and i've yet to prove my
eight-year-old self wrong--
took hold of the white buffet
plate and approached 
the aisle of steaming coffins
to suddenly feel very dizzy
and very sorry--
i was sorry i had eaten 
him and sorry that
i had wanted to pile the
plate as tall as i could
to forget him--
slice me spiral of ham--
scrambled pillow of egg--
i bleeding fist of fresh raspberry
to stain my lilac dress
i had changed into--
i had wondered what the
stain would have looked like
against the white of my wedding
gown-- i ate cake with my
fingers and devoured
cookies fast as the phases of
the moon--

were you hungry?
my mother asked as she watched to
me wiping
more crumbles from my
palms to check for bleeding--

looked up at a room full
of wood tables
a drift in the hall of 
the body of my god cut into steam--
the chef was there with a long
serrated knife and the hunk
of ham under the heat lamp
peeling slice
after slice 
after slice that
bled in fat juice on the table cloth
white table cloth--
bleed raspberry 
bleed nervous grape
juice--
how much communion tasted 
like blood--

no-- yes--
i think i didn't know how
hungry i was
i replied.