buzzcut dreaming

glass is the color of holding.
who doesn't want to take off more
of their body? what can be shed
& severed? i was a doorknob 
or a dropped peach in the valley.
winter shucked us & drank our salt.
snow up to my heart. the wind chimes
choked like geese. you were elsewhere
growing your hair long & red.
every mirror asked for a piece
of my long-gone girlhood. our attics
full of intimate dust, sighed when we woke. 
i collected my dead faces
in little jars for later. 
then, i had a sock for storing 
plastic hair. dolls bald as thumbs.
knitting wigs in the dark. hair in
all directions. the trees dreaming
of hair down to their waists.
dreaming of hopscotch & stones.
foot print in my scalp from where
god walked his angels on all fours.
my bed a little coffin floating
in the lehigh river. they windows
of stone buildings turning to eyes.
what body out there isn't watching?
at night, i look up at the moon
& see the back of my own head.
i'm shaving the hair away 
& it's floating down to earth
landing amoung the oldening leaves. 

midnight

i cut the apple open & saw your face there.
closed the halves & didn't eat for five years.
in that time, developed a craving
for milk. drank air until it thickened.
with a paring knife i cut holes 
in the night sky. save the swatches so i can
ask you what texture our unfettering was.
when did you look at me & decide,
"this man is a ghost"? if i had been looking
i could have put the flashlight to your eyes.
cutting the fingers off forks. taffy night
pulled sweet & thin. a membrane to slip under.
veil or gown? marrying beads of caramel.
midnight on the banister & midnight falling
loud as fruit. loud as a great metal pot.
we will certainly be parents in the other life.
you with an apron skeleton & me
with a hammer for a heart. it's a dangerous
hour. the murky joy. mundane thresholds:
closet, casket, creamery. a cow
laying dead on the sidewalk on her way
toward cement. you should not be here.
this is my bed. my sleep. my darkness.
putting a line of masking tape across the room
to indicate where you begin. crossing
the line just to feel the vibration
of your old breath. a lover is
an always vanishing thing. when will you
return? when will you never? how do you
count the apple seeds already in your blood?
when you miss me, do your day lilies 
open new faces? mine do & they all
have your same tongue. 

mornings

i wake up before you 
& find the sun in a can of peaches.
stand in your kichen
& chat with the bamboo plant before
asking the mountains what time it is.
they are always unsure. nodding 
their tree-lined heads.
i wash dreams from my face.
in the night, i saw us
walking in a snow storm.
white swallowing each street lamp.
i held your arm for balance
& you held mine. a swing dangled
from the moon. pushed you
& we kissed like high schoolers.
in your city, roads twist & knot
beneath the spilled stars. i wake up
before you & think
"my life is real." you make my days
split open fresh & orange.
last night on your street 
i saw our shadows &, startled, i said
"i mistook our shadows for ourselves."
there is so much of you to love.
my shadow runs his fingers through
your shadow's hair. i wake up before you
& see our life in galloons. full & 
overflowing. i wake up before you
& slip back in bed where your skin
is a kingdom. where i tell my shadow 
"this is how i want to spend 
each eggshell." open & bright.

self portrait w/ self destruction

prying petals off my face 
until only the anther is left. 
who isn't a yellow smudge of pollen? a baseball
through a window & back again. knocking
a tooth on a tombstone. filling shoes
with dirt & welcoming the fire ants.
it is not summer if i say it's not summer.
a wind picks up & momentarily frees us.
church on the moon. jesus on the moon.
it's one thing to die for other people
but a totally different thing to 
die for yourself. a finger trap.
cheat me out of my sunday. can opener
between my shoulder blades. a circle
through which birds come & go. 
the blood, like a creek, contains 
crayfish & stray hooks. coals to walk on
towards the bounce castle. i am 
walking backwards. trust fall. trestle.
the train has a plan to smash me
easy as a vase. i once held
a lily in my throat but i swallowed
too hard. most things are my fault
but especially broken bones.
i often go out into the middle of the street
& say "come & get me" to passing trucks.
they honk their horn & shout.
when it is winter, who will i convince?
who will believe how hot it used to be
inside my greenhouse heart? 
there is a fire & then their is
sleeping. duct taping my tongue
back into my face. counting 
white guitar strings on my arms.
haven't you ever set out
to make a scar?     

tracing paper

i asked you to lay still so long
you became a photograph. smile the size
of a garbage can lid. teeth like triptychs.
laid a veil down. saw your features 
like questions. where to draw the first line.
how to remember the color of our feet
in the mud. that one afternoon 
i spent hours wanting to kiss you
until the sun ripened into the moon.
the dark made herons of our young girl bodies.
creek spilled from a slit in your leg.
a television turned black & white
& we watched as the static gods prayed
to each other. i could have been
your first attic. could have held
crumpled sweaters & warm dust. light
creating spider circuses in my brain.
here is your shoulder. here is the distance
between old skin & new. our knees 
grazing each others. smell of loud grass.
a curfew like a skirt hem touching
oranged horizon. wake up now. i want to be
your sapling. i want to be watered
by august. count your freckles like
stepping stones. follow them through 
the paper to where i assemble you
& you me. a finger following my hip bone.
fireflies hovering in their angelhood. 
 

haystack in a haystack

outside the 7/11 we'd drink 
our brains blue. you, tall as 
a water tower & me with lavendering lips.
in a dream my father dies & comes back to life
to give me a bag of animal feed.
we raise cows only the cows aren't cows
they're ducks. the crops don't grow this year
& we all learn to eat ideas. me saying,
"salvation" & you saying "will you please."
in the desert, you used to say,
wild pigs would run in herds like 
kindergarten. i catelogue your textures
so that when i close my eyes
i can run my hands across the truth.
hand-sewing pant ankles because i'm short.
nothing to do with the rainforest at all,
we used benches like match books. 
an eagle delivered me a bible one night
& i opened it to find all the pages blank.
i drew wildflowers. how "consume" means
to separate parts which then cannot be
reunited. inside the husk each corn kernel
dreams yellow. dreams of becoming a star.
how many times have you been let down gently?
asking the wind to make a feather of me.
you & i in a brief green rapture.
god with a flashlight on our faces
looking for what to leave & what
to take. midnight reaching for a closet door 
& touching cool sand. you standing in the corner
tall as a water tower. eyes wide open. 

pineapple psychosis

sometimes it's pleasant to be elsewhere.
a soft needle in my arm tells me 
i am a catapult if i need to be. the bathroom
is sewn with ants & a centipede is playing cards
with the spider. often a voice will tell me
& i'll say "i don't think i can." 
shoes in my closet like latent children.
pineapples in their cages. thick feathers.
bird's nest soup for dinner. only one fork
& it's learning how to swim backstroke.
a man used to put his open hand on my back
& i'd have to shoo him away. no no not here.
not while the ceiling tiles are playing bingo.
sitting at the dining room table & across from me
the grandfather clock purses his lips. i live
far too not-alone. counting my fingers to be sure.
my alarm, a little dead bird saying
"wake up wake up." shadows forming
a brotherhood. i cover my eyes & my vision
is maroon. a sack of marbles is always also
a school of eyes. blinking the sound away.
seeing a haunting basil taste. taking my shoes off
one by one & laying down to rest. barking 
corridor. no one hear what i hear, do they?
i plug a speaker under my tongue & all that plays
is leaves rustling. i never meant to be
the television insided the television. 
take a knife to parse the nowheres from
dirt. a tree squeals. my room fits in 
my wallet. carry myself to the sidewalk.
bus passes me like a whale. 

pile your strawberries

pile your strawberries
where the birds can't see them.
ripen to turtle hearts.
the bog is calling all the girls down.
a ribbon of algae. warm lake.
geese sewing dresses from old silk.
but you have strawberries 
& no one else can touch them.
place them understones & in
the thoughts of strangers.
a man walking by with a fishing pole 
now thinking "strawberry."
strawberry like colonies of jam.
mother holding out a spoon & saying,
"would you like a taste." i always do.
sweet boiled berries. wearing sugar 
to the school dance. no one else
with a single strawberry. the gym
late at night. strawberry-less.
well, until you arrive with one
tucked behind your ear. there isn't enough
rambling in this world. go on & on
& tell me what you eat when no one else
is looking. don't eat them. not yet.
ripening takes patience. years of cradling.
i was a baby once & my flesh was pulp. 
leaves grew from my skull &
my caretakers would prune them.
we could have been a backyard or a brush.
more strawberries than you need but
that's not true because you always
need more strawberries. sleeping in
a glass bowl in the company of strawberries.
bruising like infants. 
nothing left to do but wait. 

July 

I set a bowl of milk out 
For my heart to drink. You slept 
All my life inside the mountain.
Ate quartz & shale. I shaved my head
Into a mason jar & watched it turn
Silver. Breakfasting under a waterfall.
Which one of your pets 
Died first? How old were you when
You first tried to pocket the moon?
A thief, I have always been prone 
To summertime. Saved my own egg shells
For a future ritual. I use Venus  
as a quarter sometimes.
I’ll be the gumball machine 
If you’ll watch me descend. 
Nothing beautiful is sturdy.
We broke our legs & spent all the orange.
Emptied swimming pools 
with our longing. Nightfall heavy
& thick with cicada wings. 
Could we have kissed 
Like tree branches 
or deliberate 
As a movie screen? I’ll never know 
So I come here. Swallow weights 
Known only by cloud families. 
Watch my father spend himself 
Above a factory. Rain & dust.
Your ghost smells like lavender
& corn husks. 

caramel skulls

i was made from boiled sugar 
in the backroom. every shut door 
gave me breath. ink in the ink well 
turned silver with with my sweetness. 
not a ghost but a ghost clipper. 
trimming the edges 
where there used to be ruffle.
tell me you love me like 
you will never cross the river. tell me 
you will stay awake past the death of the moon.
i have been keeping vigil as the sun
undresses & crosses arms over chest.
in my bowls i am often not the spoon
or the strawberry. who taught you red?
who did you eat past their limits?
i have a draw full of eyelashes
in case i have to go anywhere tonight.
stirring my heart with cubes 
of salt. the party was made from 
icicles. we covered our heads with 
our hands. i needed more. cut a hole
in your door with a paring knife.
called you "pear." soft as a word.
my pillow full of nowhere. come, please.
i need to be handled. i am turning 
the volume low as it will go.
can you still hear the bicycle?
i am not on my way. i am backwards 
in the boat. the river is rewind
& i follow like a fruit fly.