grapefruit 

you said your mother made
you eat grapefruit for breakfast

purple-pink flesh--
torn out with the spoon
dip in sugar when no one  
was looking--

juice down your arms--

this is our first lesson
in how a body should be bitter--

should sting as it comes into being--

when i was little sometimes
i would swipe lemons from
the fridge-- cut them in half
& dip them in the sugar bowl--

like crystals off your 
puckering body--

& my skull was a grapefruit 
to be sliced in half--

tart & resentful   
on your tongue--

i miss the breakfast bar
in the living room--

the swivel chairs--

the dead light bulbs--

i miss you in spoonfuls lately--

leaf of basil 
forkful of fresh salsa--

you're chopped--
onions & tomatoes-- 
fierce cilantro

what is to be done 
with the over protective
skin of grapefruit?

worn as an overcoat

when i leave mine 
in the cubby at elementary school--

i learned early 
from you that womanhood
is so much like grapefruit--

like grandmothers
in the sink--

cutting hair--

round heads--
round cirtus swallowed whole--

lemons swallowed whole--

the chairs swallowed
whole

the violets on the sink
swallowed whole

biting corridors of
a body--

you said your mother
liked grapefruit--
sometimes eating it
pre-cut in fruit cups--

& on her windowsill
she had an antique brass scale with
fake grapes & pears
to balance the sides--

each time i would 
walk over while no one
was looking to 
squeeze the plastic orbs--

as if one time
i would arrive & find
them plump & full of juice--

i don't like grapefruit

what's left of my girlhood 
in laid out on scales--

is maybe in your throat--

is maybe bitter &
bruised pink--

i sometimes sleep
in the rinds--

comforted by the smell
of metal knives

& dead light bulbs--

mother, let's eat something sweet

the lemon has two halves--

climb in the sugar bowl 
with me 

let's be women