inkwell

in the yard, we dug for water 
with our plastic sand shovels.
shoveling grit & stones. pausing to inspect
ancient coins. our yard was a masoleum.
a ground of dinosaur bones & shard 
of ancient pottery.
father commandeered the wheel barrow
to cradle his broken televisions to & from
their old graves. he told them
"hush. it's almost over." i dreamed water.
i spoke only hope of water. 
sometimes laying on my back to look at the sun
i would believe, momentarily, that a lake
was lapping at my ankles. then, sitting up,
i would find nothing but the genuflecting grass.
it took weeks but also maybe only 
a couple of hours to hit the vein.
not me but my brother. him saying, 
"finally!" & all of us gathering by his crater.
the ink began as just a pen scribble stain.
we peered. watched the blue-black collect.
mix with dirt. a bruise is a special kind of wound.
colorful. enduring. a kind of skyline.
we watched the bruise like a nebula
until it opened. ink coming faster.
filling the dirt. blue on our hands.
blue between blades of grass.
father asking, "what have you done?"
brother, covering his face in shame.
gushing all night. slipping down the street.
the ink took with it the legs of the trees
& some of the rabbit's eyes.
but, secretly, when the other were
trying to sleep. i dipped my hand in.
i watched the color fill every line
of my hand. stamped my print
on the other side of the moon. 
i said, "hush. this is our secret."
the moon nodded obediently.

unswept

the catastrophe was soft as ice.
every corner of the room catalogued our hair.
help the mites to their homes.
three fingers to trace base board.
each digit turned centipede. find me
your favorite crease & i'll lay there.
journey of a thousand legs. oven clock saying
"there has been a power outage." winds
spitting their old names. in the apartment
i tricked the lights into thinking i was
a visitor. my bones thinned to birds.
the birds laid belly-up.
on the porch cigarette butts gathered
like church goers. how could anyone
take the broom & dance like father-daughter?
i never wanted a wedding so bad.
tower of fruit. fresh apples in the fridge:
red & righteous. trying new ways 
to stack my shoes in the closet. brushing
dirt from my barefeet. hard wood floors 
are a memory of the forest. the forest, then,
loud & rife with its own dusts. do you know
who you will be after gathering?
i still do not. for another day. for another 
day. waking up to the sound of debris 
rattling & trying to melody. 
i cannot afford to lose 
any accumulation. please stay with me
as i make a home amoung corners.

leech 

discuss morality of blood drinking. 
ask mouth, "how much more?"
swim the river razor. fish flute
from behind ear. talk to the channel
of static heart ache. leave with less legs.
an oar in the orchestra. drink
with gush & flow. flowers 
in their perfect pots. shoulders 
for leaning. motherhood freezing 
in the winter along with all other 
cares. flip knee cap like coin.
ask who is allowed to eat who
& if so what part? femur? artery?
iron? who gets to wrap the sea
in wax paper? laying down.
a doctor is waiting for his orders
to take away the pain. we used to be
salvation. used to close our eyes
& feel evil seeping out of bone.
in the swamp we told the birds
our secrets & they laugh before
flitting far away. a wing is always
what another has & you do not.
we do not have much. no devouring here,
only keep going. finding a place 
to become rapture. the between
of the between. you won't notice
what i take. or, you will, 
& we will become lovers then, right?
a river suddenly gone still. 
toad's white belly. heron's ankle. 
the sound of a boat's engine
sputtering open early orange dawn. 
i am the need you wish you could have.
asking another, "do we become 
what we contain?" another saying,
"no, we contain what we become."

vegetable broth 

grease gathering for mason jar worship.
white. slick. blubber of a moon whale.
i watch my mother bathe the left over garden.
everyone else smashing ants with their fingers 
& saying, "this has to stop." the wooden spoon
stirring carrot limbs. heat can remove
any kind of essense. pry away part of your ghost.
sometimes, in july's mirage,
i'll go outside & fill cup after cup
with my longing. the word "ache" 
is a paperweight. when the AC dies, we give it
a good shake. hold our breath as it 
sputters alive again. the pot's rounded bottom.
burner hot & red as a planet. 
when i look at celery i always see playground slides.
a hand flat against my back.
the loosening carrot fists. fingers uncurl.
i tell my mother she is a good mother 
but i say it in my head. in the kitchen
dust collections on shelves. old cook books
turn to moths that die trying to talk to 
the sun. the vegetable stock bubble & talks
about aquifers & wells. dreams of floating
& steam & cloud. so so close to air.
salt scattered into the water. each grain
dissapeared. gone to sleep. sound of spoon
against metal. smell of the word "always."
she takes a taste before putting the lid on
to let it cool. ants carry sugar
the size of their hearts toward 
all the house's seams. light above the oven.
carrot's untied shoelaces.
last to bed, i can see the cooling take place.
how, once livid, the stock becomes 
a home with a door & a living room. 

baby teeth glass

in the bedroom we talk about cell division.
i opened my mouth to show you a home video
& you told me you've watched sunflowers
jump off bridges. sometimes i want to
spoon your eyes from your head & wash them
in honey. so much about being human is
about what we cannot take back. my uncle
has baby teeth still. jagged little grave markers
yellowed from talking to the sun too long.
we make a good pair, you & i. my baby teeth 
know how to play violin. yours bash their heads
on the keys of a piano. someday, when we are old
& call ourselves "painters" when really we just
open & close the blinds. i want to pretend
i'm writing the sky. tell me what kind of cloud
you're craving. my teeth tell tall tales 
to each other like kindergardenters. 
my fingers are in a knot. i have a glass case
for keeping my real set of hands. i confess
i am prone to hoardin8g spares. spare heart
& lungs & ankles. got a flat tire once
on my way to church. god laughed like
sirens. i know very little about my own
wave length. do physics with me.
i hold your hand & you tell me not to.
make a locket of my face & hurl it
toward another galaxy where, a wandering creature
will pluck it from a tangle. cup my face
in his-her palms & say something to the effect of
"i am so deeply in love right now."

Duration 

I want to be outlasted 
By fog horns. Want a headstone 
For a placemat. Break glow- proof bread.
I take  
Measuring tape 
To observe the distance between 
My opal & skin. Inside, I am 
Tin solider & less-wooden tree. 
I am a balled up black stocking.
A ceiling fan. No one should 
Try to take this long. Will you be 
A fisherman with me? Talk to crickets 
With our eyes shut as blush compacts. 
Haul up a net of chick-a-dees.
Let’s make children from clay. 
Glaze them jade & Jupiter.
Cut the planets strings to watch them
Float to the fiber glass galaxy.
Construction is on-going. Will soon
Be wordless. I wake up to a day lily 
Sprouting from my pillow where you
Had laid your head. What use 
Is my Tuesday with the rind peeled &
Fruit honeyed. Buffet for the
Never-to-be-dead. Counting ribs,
We’re both missing one.
Licking red from fingers. More & more.
Waking up to a pair of dice.
Allergic to noon. Shining a flashlight 
In your face. 

compost room

making good on the promise,
i took soft handfuls & deposited them
behind the door of the old nursery.
you & me, we used to be blood.
used you open our veins like window blinds.
now, emptying the fridge of all its organic.
do you remember eating celery 
on the porch in winter? or cutting
a tomato down the forehead?
we had to regrow in the most urgent way.
all the ankle. all the rake.
throwing in shoes & the garden hose.
fingernails & fresh egg shells.
a whisk. a worm farm. an old photograph.
watching the warmth go to work.
it's not a place to walk through.
open the door just a crack. smell deep
& aching. how a mushroom becomes 
a boy before he is gone. all kinds 
of faces in the pile. peering from behind
a banana peel, a little neighbor girl.
under a baseball cap, a stray fox
who used to eat melon from my hand.
i have never had a green thumb.
instead i talk to my potted plants 
& tell them about each of the rooms
in my house. bed. kitchen. basement.
compost. crawl space. the compost room
spreads. i find its fresh death
in my closet. shut the door & pretend
everything is alright. then i wake up
& find the grit & the dirt reaching
beneath the bed. i suppose i am ready to be 
repurposed. decide to sleep. give it
what it wants. a school of bones.
the pink of me. the blue. the red.
gentle & patient. letting the rot get to work.
have you ever been dismantled 
like a glass of sand? pouring out.
roots weaving. light from the window 
sticking to my face. open the door.
come with me. 

smoothie machine

in the blade nest i settled 
with the tree bark & the moss.
from now on everything will be swallowed.
teeth used for necklaces. i give one
to each of the people i've ever slept with.
they wake up with a chain around their neck
& the tooth buzzing & ready.
we were bananas ripening past ourselves
towards sugar. sun in our pocketbooks.
moon waiting in the bathtub.
needed more money for useless:
gas station key chain & galloons of milk.
stood on the street corner & sold
cups full. brimming. waved at strangers 
who waved back. gave teeth away 
in the hopes they would return the favor. 
an eye for an eye 
is only true about eyes. 
i threw in old sweaters & 
a hair brush. the smoothie machine laughed
& struggled but finally found 
the nothing texture. we drank mangos
in the train station. leaned against
a scuffed wall 
while knees tried to catch 
their directions. always uptown.
window shopping in each others faces.
a handful of blueberries. a sock.
hair clips. pocking a tea bag 
just in case of hot water. a round 
wooden table taken apart until
it could fit. i carry a straw 
in my backpack. always prepared.
most of life is better taken
like a coarse river & less like
a still life. it's about finding 
where the liquid could arrive.
salt on the table. a pinch
over the shoulder. 
leaves you hungry. searching the house
for just one more. just one more. 

renaming bones

the forearm is full of pistil.
not gun but gone. a mouth full of hurry.
five new kinds of salsa in the sunrise.
my feet full of gumballs & come on come on.
more than enough match box cars.
the banister you held to make your way
down to hell. i hear they have
a washing machine who will sing you to sleep.
legs full of siren & syringe. an ambulance 
is my brother & he goes back & forth
full of blood. we could eat outside
even though it's raining. we could
wash out skulls out like mugs. i want to call
a rib a jaw harp. want to played & fingered.
call me communal & calliope. no use
in sleeping when the bouncey ball
still has so much farther to go.
looking at the x-rays i get what they mean.
i am terribly ordinary when it comes down
to the scaffolding. they point my pelvis & say
"what should we call this?" i say "cutting board"
without a single thought. i used to love
a bone collector. he grinned & showed me
the closet where he kept them. 
each wraped in silk. "this one is from
a boy i kissed in a corn field" &
"this one is from the jaw of 
a terrible chef." i should have asked
to touch them but instead i asked 
which one he'd want of mine. gave him
a single tooth & i feel him sometimes
chewing with it. we all find ways
to make use of each other. i removed
one of your ribs without telling you.
you had so many. you didn't need it.
when i see it in the bottom of my backpack
i do not call it "rib." i say
"hello waning moon, i am here."

cicada wreath 

welcome to my plush madness.
i have a secret mouth for 
the occasional neccesary scream.
once, a lover took me out to the edge 
of his favorite woods & said
"this is where i let myself go."
he shrieked & i tried but couldn't.
it's far too intimate a thing to be heard
by trees & rocks
there is a species for my home.
five legs & the missing sixth.
opening all the windows to teach 
the children how to fly. we used
to holiday all the time. set up
thumbs worth of fire. harths 
to lay down in as logs.
hasn't everyone's father cut down
their favorite tree? haven't we all
wanted to be an iris?
in the linen closet, everyone
can be a ghost. green lights 
for guests. we walk without breathing.
exhausted, i'll often cross my legs
until they turn to tails.
who is keeping track of the seasons?
not me. not ever since the storm.
you think you're done seeing your sons
& then all of a sudden here they are again.
hungry & perched in the sink.
i want to be washed like a potato.
the lover, he was not the kind of man
who you would expect to scream.
this is why his sound haunts me.
how long had he saved it for?
is there one inside me? dormant?
the cicadas, they know what it means
to be patient. either that or 
their bodies betray them.
refuse to break surface. talking
to dirt & saying, "today today today."
no not yet. then, haunted daylight.
cloud blur & yellow. 
standing small & loud in the grass
while windshield wipers
do everything they can.