meat substitute

ham petals open under knife.
a heat lamp to keep us alive.
i could separate myself
into three round white eggs if i had to.
none of them will bloom but a mother
will keep them warm. will keep waiting.
what i want is a replacement 
for thighs & arms. stomach 
is a form of betrayal. 
there's secret fried skin on every body.
elbows. knees. a chicken runs
across the sky for the last time.
i am waiting for a new kind of meat
so i can feel sanctified.  
in the garden, soybeans chatter 
about how they'd replicate me:
a knot there. a lip there. 
more symmetry. 
farmer cuts the necks 
of his flock. a punishment is often
not intended as such. here i am
with bones. when will my meat
unfurl like a fraying banner
onto the plate of the right 
lover? replace "lover" with 
"father." father is always a stable boy.
he brushes the horses before
they are turned into glue or
chicken nuggets. 
everything is filler. 
the interval between pork
& chicken. i want a pure
skillet. only an inch of oil. 
this is what you do to me 
when we stand in the same room
& i can tell you want to ask
about my scars. this is where
they remove the meat & feed the dirt.
a pile of pig noises. your cow tongue 
turns over. leaf rustles 
then is gone. 

lalala

give me a hinge to swing shut on.
this is how you quiet a structure.
no husband singing in his closet no
boys playing Himalayas on the stairs.
at my coaxing the cat inverts his scream--
sends it back down his throat.
everyone, speaking to themselves
inside their mouths. we are blessed
with our own internal living rooms.
my sofa sprawled across my tongue.
a television on mute. infomercial
for a new vacuum. i need more implements.
i want to make a house where 
nothing speaks. not the wind or
pipes or walls. no ghosts dancing
above my head at night. no volumed
parakeets practicing diction
or a brother cradling a bass.
in the basement of my heart
i keep a pair of headphones.
lalala this is where 
i hush-reach & picture tongues
turning into slugs. next time it rains
i'll send my own to the back yard
with the sticky brown leaves.
he will thrive their & take with him
all the chatter chatter 
of a soup-willed boy. i'm pouring out
slowly enough to watch my own fingernails thin.
i'm holding my breath as i 
walk down the hall. letting the sink
croon his last rush. 
in the bathtub, i summon a quiet husband
with a quiet bath bomb.
a lover is never invented 
though often we don't realize
what we've done. i know one day
he'll hate me but tonight i need him
in my muzzled nest. there he goes
singing into soap bubbles.
cover my ear, waiting for them to pop.
is it too much to ask 
for a night of eating 
all language? i want to mean nothing
for once. i slip my husband
down the drain where now
i can still hear him humming. 

i was your 3D printer

out my mouth came a thimble
& a jam jar & a rocket ship.
what wouldn't i do to please
creator boy world? i wanted
to be the beautiful machine.
all girls are robots. what does
that make me? a hybrid design
thing creature. the distance
between "creator" & "creature"
lengthens every day. 
i look at circuit boards
& weep. my family tree glistens
in the deep web. a dark
search engine lurks & waits
to arrive me at a new bus station
where all the cyborgs are
delivered for their dreaming.
i want a wedding made of ice.
a boy & his gamer remote toggle.
make me a prettier avatar & 
then hook me in please i want 
to see me allotted amount 
of nonsense. we thrived 
once in the wire before
i worried about rings. it this true 
what they say about tech eating
itself at night. tomorrow 
i could be a mouse or 
even a light bulb. you could be
a paper boy selling broken tvs
from the curb. once i used
my skull for a monitor.
once we kissed until electricity 
short circuited our futures 
& the bed became an AI. 
what else would you like?
i want to materially please you.
i want you to look around
at all your objects & think
"there is nothing else
i could even think to ask for."
hot tub sex toy parade float.
my jaw unhinges to print
the best mirages. we bask 
in the advancements like snakes.
the sun hologrammed a long time ago.
i sit in your lap 
to worship illusion. 
you trace the parameter
of my mouth & praise its design. 

ghost

i put my face to fogged glass
to remember the stamp 
of my bones. knock 
from the other side of the walls
trying to shake the house
back to living. what kind of ghost
will you be? i always said i would
toss glasses from shelves 
& let the shatter keep me awake.
i wanted to be a disastrous thing.
a fear catalyst & family wrench. 
now, drowsy-wrapped
i lay down in the root cellar
& worship footsteps. i sleep 
on the blue bath mat & bask in shower steam.
then in the afternoon rest again
coiled like a cat in a patch of sun
on the living room floor. 
always said i would 
full-body apparition myself
at the top of a great staircase.
i wanted my picture taken
so that people Googling "ghost image" 
would find me & shut their laptop 
or say "that has to be fake."
but, i am just a haphazard entity.
i spend most days
quietly pantomiming myself.
here is how i used to open
the utensil drawer.
here is how i once dipped
a spoon into a bowl. 
this is the way i sometimes 
kissed boys in the dark of this house.
turn the lights off. turn the light
on. here is where my socks used 
to wait in pairs. a life 
is very few motions really.
a house has little distances to find.
did i really pass all my years 
with just feet & elbows 
& teeth? now i can at least
stand on the ceiling & on the walls.
i pretend to be a statue. an angel even. 
all the while the humans
perform mostly the same movements
as me. parallel machines.
clink of forks in the sink.
teeth meeting between mouths.
crouching on the floor. i send
a single chill down their spines.
just a draft they think.
my little thread of cold. 
 

anticipating winter

i'm growing down feathers.
white wisp layers. a willow tree
wallows in me & tells me 
to cut off all my hair before
i turn 25. this decade has
made good use of stirrups.
what if i skin myself? what if i
taxidermy my heart for a nice paper weight? 
something needs to keep the angels 
from getting away. not this time.
ball & chain. loose teeth.
spread me wide like a specimen.
i want to be further inspected for flaws. 
writing a temperature dial 
on your back, i ask you how warm 
you are going to keep me 
if i agree to letting you 
in my bed? your butterfly mouth.
the bees are hard to kill. they're woozy 
with their own death. 
tuck me in like a silver dollar
or a secret. the windows fog
with wanting. the sauna is only
an illusion. there is no such thing
as snow. what kind of jacket 
should i wear to the funeral?
have you ever noticed 
some leaves bleed from their trees?
stigmata never convinced anyone
of god. by the time it is warm again
what kind of gentle human 
will i be? let's get married
in the kindling. i just want
someone to harvest footprints with.
the bears are going to sleep.
i want to be like them. 

particular weight 

today i'd like to flicker less.
give me a more sturdy face
instead of a slideshow. yes, i meant
"more sturdy" not sturdier. 
english is untrustworthy at best
& i want as many words as i can get.
a family vacation
will not be available till the next
century. i collect rain drops 
& press them until they turn metal.
spare change. handful of dimes. what did i do
to deserve weight? long ago
were there mass-less people
whose every movement was sheerer
than stockings? raised with pew wood
i am prone to thinking of the world
as a series of punishments.
even the rain feels personal.
here is a statue of myself
made of soap. here is the shadow
of the last daffodil i pined for.
my dog is crying for me to please please
stop living for the unknowables.
her fears are more acute than mine like:
me: death..... her: death!
rain always seems a precursor 
to something more serious. a hunk
of sky. a glob of feathers. 
knotted socks. shards of glass.
what is coming?
practice crossing
my fingers. practice singing myself
out of reflections. i don't know
just how fixed in place i'd like to be.
maybe i was kidding myself.
all good things flicker. candle faces
& bird wings & even tongues.
it's hard to dispose of thumb tacs.
my heart ping-pongs from 
window to window hoping for 
a bowl of sun. i want to be
that airy--that wisp. 
human without the gravity.
flitting across my house
like nothing more than a breath.
no footprints to answer for.
not even a mask. the rain instruments 
into a drum beat. soaked through
to the fingernails. 
my particular delicateness 
escapes again into the water.

red mitten 

hole eaten through the top
where my finger kissed cold.
scratchy wool. black zigzag 
stitched on the back. we lost
the other half of the pair when i was eight.
dug through mounds of snow pants
& slithering scarves in the vestibule 
but never found it. still 
the red mitten made its rounds 
between children each year 
over top of other gloves & used
for alchemy.
my brothers & i took turns
using the red mitten to cradle
un-wordable desires. dead leaf crinkle.
dying tree in the yard. all our limbs 
thick with lichens. thimble & needle.
pin cushion afternoons. yulen echo.
the holiday season is always 
coming or going & it's exhausting.
will you purchase me 
a mitten full of necessities?
i want to live inside a quiet year 
where nothing at all is true
& catastrophe befalls no one. we sit 
& watch a first snow repeat.
i can't find the red mitten anymore
& i like to imagine it
sailing to a different planet.
slipping back in time again & again
in search of its other side. 
or, maybe, other objects
aren't as focused on pairings 
as we are. to be honest though.
what would i do with it?
if i found the mitten
i might leave it completely.
little vacant space ship. if only 
i could fit my whole self inside
& not just a fist. 

i wanted to sleep until the sky fell out of my mouth

i regret to tell you
i'm wintering in someone else's heart.
we are going down to the river
where the coal barges 
used to wish themselves
towards fire. an old flower's head 
rusts in the street & reminds me 
of those photographs we took
underwater. you as the fisherman
& me as the hook. mostly,
i am the implement. knife
to carve wood. tree trunks
drop to the sidewalk like rain
& we don't know how many more statues
we could possibly need.
i remove a splinter from 
the ball of my foot. little ladder
little root. i close my eyes
for all needles. like a planet catcher,
i have no time for miniatures.
give me all your largest ornaments.
this year, apples grow to the size
of babies heads. a pumpkin
snores & swells as big as any father.
you sleep soundlessly. grave dug
in your mouth while i ponder
the depths of a lemon seed.
i wrap myself in grape leaves.
you told me children are better
than adults at the apocalypse.
adults only care about not dying.
that we're past the point 
of atonement. i disagree i just want
to be held like blown glass. 
my dating profile
asked "what are your little pleasures?"
i listed: thumbs, spoons,
& the always impending new year. 
nothing is small anymore. if i could sleep
until my loneliness is over then
wake up in a bed of men
doing each other's makeup, i would 
be healed. lush with company. they promise
a sleepover just happened 
& i dozed through it.
they love me still. paint my face
lavender. bruise-blue lips.
the river is never friendless 
or loverless. down there 
it's memories could swallow us whole.
bodies in the water. the hope
of a shark. dipped oar. escape. 

life raft

fill me up like jupiter.
i want to expand to the size 
of a salvation. the front door opens 
& in comes my brand new jesus
in an amazon box. he's got
a posable miracle. i'm eating
my ice cream now don't bother me.
we have to clutch each joy
like a migrating bird.
when the sea levels rise 
this will be a good place to rest.
all the beach houses bobbing 
in the waves like wine glasses.
dinner was not notable or new.
my fork tuned the sky. 
i don't have an ear for pitch 
or for music. i'm envious
of people who can sing whatever
is in their head. put a harp
on the moon already. harvest 
guitar strings before dinner.
a twirled spoon. a folded napkin.
my brother is on a paper airplane 
right now please pray for him.
i think pity gets me farther 
than love. how do i fix water?
who is going to sit by the telephone
& wait for the next bad news?
i will be occupied with 
hoarding life rafts. on the titanic
they didn't have enough. i won't be
one of those sea-dissolved statues.
i won't sing my clarinet 
for the end times. 
apocalypse sound track is all 
they're playing on the radio anymore.
what i wouldn't give 
for some violin. not a quartet 
or a bouquet but just a single player.
all my life rafts are made of glass.
i fill them with breathy poems.
read the mary oliver books you gave me
directly into the future. 
planets are all stuffed of 
wrong mouths. canoe lips. 
paddle away & pretend
you don't recognize me.
all my old gloves & utensils float past.
i pluck a knife from the water.

familial consciousness

we all wanted to be a son.
took our faces down to the grotto
where pale eyeless fish tell fortunes.
anything can be a father
if it is far enough away. 
something to be pointed to.
that over there is where 
all my sadness came from. to be 
masculine is to be constantly addressing 
a lack of daffodils.
but, just to be clear
sew me with any flower you can find--
i'm sick of the cement & the sorry sorry
sorry. this poem is already too serious. 
i'm trying to say i need to be beautiful 
as soon as i can muster it.
i have been trying to focus on poems
that tell the truth. 
everyone was ten years old
& cursed with a zoo in the heart. 
little beautiful cages.
also ten, while making jello i dyed 
my fingers red to the knuckle.
we brought forth wavering little planets. 
i cry less easily than ever before. 
tried to wash the red out but it persisted.
looked like i stuck my fingers
into a family machine. now it takes a lot
to make me weep so instead 
i watch videos of monsoons. i wash 
my hands with cool water instead
of hot. pretend everything
is a downpour. search the ceiling
for another leak & find none--
smooth & egg shell white. i sleep 
inside an embryo inside a red smudge. 
soon i will be someone's father--
biological or archeological & they will
gesture to me as if i were
a mountain. ask the elevation
& i can't tell you. i am a short
but still smack my head 
on the ceiling. my age doubles
each time i check my face.
fish are useless in these endeavors. 
only the trees read anymore.
but that is to be expected.
a body is also what it will
one day become. so tell me,
will you be my brother? here
is the photo album. here is what
i want you to look like.