house warmning 

i belong in the frying pan
a skirt of egg white around me. 
when we swim in oil 
i will give you my purse
& my phone. you can do what you want
with them. my mother has 
a cast iron pan that she loves
like a daughter. she makes good use of it
& then on sundays 
ties a bow around the handle.
any implement can be a girl 
in the right pair of hands.
once, only once i cooked a chicken breast
in the bottom of a pot. i watched
the pink turn white. muscle of the bird
like ribbons of bark. a knot
of sinew. i plug the sun into 
a power strip & it flickers. prayers are
a kind of outlet. throw you fears 
through your mouth.
you text message my grandmother,
sending her a picture of us 
in our drag dresses. none of us
are girls anymore. i am often
a spatula & you are often
a whisk. my grandmother is dead
& all her pots & all her pans
are elsewhere. who is to say.
maybe lurking in a closet
stirring each other. i am told
i should let the reader know 
who the you is in my poems 
but the truth is it could be
anyone. every person is in danger
of becoming a "you." just yesterday
i was a "you" in the heart 
of a strange white man wearing 
a fisherman's hat. he said 
"you, what are you doing here?"
i said "i am just sitting on this bench 
waiting for my orange slices 
to dry out." he accepted this
& moved on. i don't actually own
a frying pan or a pot for that matter.
i do own a boil & rice you can make
in the microwave. i put my mouth
close to the window & blow to make fog.
i write my name with my index finger
across the glass. the word simmers 
& oozes like a warm yolk. when i say
"i belong" i don't mean
as punishment. i mean there are
few other options left. 
i mean i stepped out of bed
& into hot snapping oil. 
pink to white. a chicken upside down
where the sun shoul be.

bird tree

if you come upon a tree made of birds
you should be grateful. a bird 
is a shifting kind of thing. at any moment
i could find myself a hawk or a swallow.
have you ever missed your hollow bones?
flight is only several phylum away.
talon roots. all throat. 
feather thick branches. no voices
just rustling. the first bird tree arrived
before there were humans. one bird perched
& then another & then another until
they were collaborative. until they shared
organs. until one mouth was another mouth
was another mouth. they stay deep in the forest
where no one might startle them.
deep in the forest where time has moved yet.
where a prehistory grazes on coal.
i know all this because i am a forest walker.
i fill pockets with stones & flowers. i listen
to green ghosts & whistle till the song
comes back to me. i found the bird tree
& i wept. my tears turned 
to mud. my knees became root & brush
& my body knew the wildfires & the floods
& the drip of overripe nectar down 
the trembling trunk. the birds eyes
all turning to coin & flashing with life.
i filled my pockets with feathers 
but the feathers were gone by the time
i got home. i filled my mouth 
with rocks but swallowed 
each & every one of them. the bird tree
is up there waiting for us.
i forgot about boys up there. i forgot
about my ribs. i was just another 
forest statue. in my house sometimes
i wish there were men made of birds
who might come & stand over me.
there is a lot of flesh in my town
& a lot of toe bones on the sidewalk.
how much practice does it take
to grow a single feather. i stare harshly
into my skin. not a single one.
in the presence of the tree i managed to sprout
three white feathers they quickly fell out
& blew away. where are those feathers?
whose are they now?

bullseyes 

the distance between
needle & need is not far enough.
in the cupboard my bouquet of syringes
is taking selfies. is it still a selfie 
if the picture is occasionally someone else?
what can i do to become more 
disposable. i need a nice trashbag
to dance in. out behind my house
a trash monster devours the rinds of
my oranges. a ring appears on my leg
& it's neither a trap door 
or a coin. it's possible 
a manhole cover. i am possibly
a sewer. all the water is 
running away down the side of the mountain.
what have you evacuted from recently?
i am scared the planets will align wrong
& all my friends will turn to basil.
i press a needle into the wall
& inject exactly what we both need.
the house becomes hairy & hungry.
a fever is settling into both our bones.
holes in the ceiling reveal 
my neighbor. he smokes 
all day. he kisses the cigarette
like a house husband. rings of smoke
curtsy in his living room. every living room
has a dying room on the opposite side.
i pull up the floor boards 
to find mine. not what you might expect.
not all black or all white,
just a light sepia tone across everything
& a sleepy feeling. 
a bowl of red hard candies promises 
if you eat one you will never leave.
when participating in a haunting
it is most important to not use
your hands. don't touch anything.
my favorite ghost runs his finger 
across my shoulder & i ask him
if he knows where needles are born.
he does not. a needle bush
is alive somewhere. the hands 
of the pickers are raw from 
grazing the implements. i used to 
knick my palm & my thumb.
i have been a red tomato pin cushion. i have been 
a dying room complete with a gramaphone.
after it rains, i'm going to convince the water
to form a lake in my bath tub.
i will fill the syringes with water
& press them into my tongue 
when i feel myself slipping beneath 
the sofa again. a man is soon coming
to break the blood vessels on my neck. 
i will hand him a need 
& not a needle. i will tell him
to press his hand to the ring.
i will ask him to bring me a lake. 
press the needle right here.

time on the moon

take a twig & jab it into the soil.
now you have a sundial. now,
in the glow of the moon, you have 
a way of knowing what part 
of the lunar afternoon it is.
on the moon, there is no such thing
as morning or night or even midday.
the moon creatures toss bones in the dirt
to ask when the day is over. once, a day lasted
several human lifetimes.
the moon beings wept & pleaded with the day.
they said let us go, please let us go
but the day just kept working. 
the moon-rocks grow beards 
near the end of a cycle. the moon dial
in your backyard should not be disturbed.
we should check it often. we are 
made of water after all 
& whatever the moon says we should do 
we will do. once, the moon told me
to swim to the bottom of a swimming pool
in the dead of winter. my skin prickled
with the cold & from beneath the water
i saw the moon peering in. 
we have assumed she is gentle & kind 
for too long. the truth is
the moon is just deeply curious, willing
to knock glasses of water off counters.
eager to let pots boil over. she has 
no way of taking notes so she 
tampers & tampers & tampers. once,
in a bowl of vegetable soup, 
i saw the reflection of the moon looming
over my shoulder. the moon was watching me
put lips to the hem of the bowl. the moon
is jealous of tongues. it wants one very bad.
the dial reads 4pm on the moon. up there 
the people are rejoicing. i can sometimes hear
their singing. they clutch moon rocks 
until the rocks turn to dust. they dream
of a great rain. they tell fairy tales of trees
& the color green on earth. one tells them 
to plunge a rod into the moon dust 
& try to read the time of day 
on earth. they discover my 8 pm 
all glossy & dripping & the moon people
they dream of having early nights. 
all the while, the moon beneath them 
shudders in the cold of itself.
i wave goodnight out the window.
my eyes become trap doors into a morning.
the moon: a vaulted ceiling.
a flashlight on a round face. 

lullaby 

we stole our fathers shoes,
the heaviest ones. each of us
cradled one like a baby-- told them
to hush. we escaped by the light 
of the fireflies who followed us down
into the closet at the end
of town. where have you gone
& never come back? this is a story of
failed elopement. the weight of show
in my arms, my brother lagging behind
as the world oscillates between
tundra & thick tall brush,
the shoe infant fussing
while i told it stories i remember 
from when i was just a single 
right appendage. all textbooks
have lied about the growth of humans.
we grow from our hands. i was first
a pinky, then a thumb then followed
all the rest. the shoes get heavier
as we go. my brother, clutching the shoe
to his chest & listing 
all the light object he can think of.
he says feather feather gust of wind
a single leaf until the boot
is as managable as air. we are not sure
what we will do when we get to the closet.
we did not see this on TV. 
i havea duck call in my pocket
made from a single blade of grass.
a great goose might arrive
& shelter us beneath her wings.
my brother asks me why are father
is our father & i tell him
no one is sure 
where the first father came from 
but they are sure there was 
no turning back. even the trees
have fathers. the only creature
without fathers is the fireflies
& look at how they glow.
they whisper in a secret language
& i tell my brother we should study it.
he says it's best to let secrets remain.
this is the difference between
him & me. he holds the shoe tight
until it stops sobbing. i put the single shoe on
& stomp around in the dirt. 
the closet has a chandelier 
& a dirt floor. the closet was made
slightly askew. when i say 
we needed to hide i mean we had
no idea where the edge of town was.
somewhere my dad was looking
for his children. he was slicing 
the night to pieces with a flashlight.
we are terrible runaway children.
hearing him laugh, limbs fell 
off trees. the boots broke 
into wails. hush, yes hush we said
until there was no sound 
& the closet doors cradled us
by its handles.

a single popcorn kernel 

my popcorn tree bursts each morning
with all its limbs of kernels
turning white & soft. i sit underneath
to watch. little shells raining down 
like insect carapaces. i think 
of the popcorn machine we had when i was little:
a small spitting device. catching 
the popcorn, sound of each kernel 
meeting bowl. we filled whole rooms,
with popcorn, my brother & i, & laid
in the mounds. popcorn crunching 
beneath our bodies. what else carries
the same magic? the truth is 
i planted the popcorn tree for a past self
who i needed to entertain. i set 
a pair of shoes in front of the tree
& wait for her to arrive. she stands 
like an obelisk. she is amused
by the popping. nearby, a movie theater
is sitting like the carcass of a whale
at the bottom of the ocean. fish gnaw
at its windows. an invisible film
is playing all over. no no, i won't say
we are all actors because we are certainly not
but we do pass by scenes every 
time & time again. just a few days ago
i saw a man feeding geese in a parking lot 
& that was likely the opening moment. 
the credit screen rolls
each night before the stars. kernels reform 
into their amber selves. i tuck my knees into my chest
in the hopes that i too might 
grow a shell, no matter how thin
or rupturable. there are people on this earth
who have killed other people & they also 
eat popcorn & some of them even know
about how to plant a popcorn tree. most of us
have a self who has done terrible things.
i am trying to not make a kernel 
of him. i tell him to sit & watch the tree
un-bloom. i wrap him in celophane
to keep him from going stale.
see, without butter. popcorn just tastes
like air. the holy spirit. maybe that's
too far. i eat the air or the popcorn
from my own handfuls. a single kernel
hovers in ever doorway. the movie theater
was a mirage or a monster. i put the old shoes
back in the closet until tomorrow.

what color waiting room would you like?

by now we could have had a cave of cheese
with all this waiting. 
a cool tunnel.
round after round of wheels. 
the night hangs across my face 
like a cheese clothe. 
all full of holes. someone is going to need to
vacuum the hallway. someone is must
uncrumple the staircase. what i want
is a life without knees or knuckles--
without caves at all. 
across the spine of the mountain
there are old mine shafts bears use
as caves. these caves go deeper deeper
into the rock. i was once a rock
before all this nonesense about flesh
sunk into my being. i tell my dog
she has to drink water 
or we will both die.
i tell my dog she is brave & needs to 
cross the river without me. we keep waiting
for someone to buy a new lightbulb
or for God to invent a new kind 
of eyelash. a horse will soon be 
the first mammal on mars. everything is red
in the wrong light: glowing aching red.
cheese petals open like lotus. 
i am there with my whisk & my paring knife.
we keep waiting 
for a dad with dress shoes 
& black socks. we keep waiting for 
a pure white moon 
that spits down
like a search light on the sidewalk. 
in the meantime we should brainstorm
something lucrative. 
i can make candles
& you, you can watch me. you can tell me
how long the wick should be.
i'll make you one too, 
thread it down your throat
like a new vein. oh my candle. tell me
how you'd like to burn tonight. 
tell me the color waiting room
you'd like me to build you. whose hands 
are you wearing today. i stole a coal miner's hat
& now i am in charge of everything.
a stick of dynamite is ready
to plummet. we are waiting for 
a scared empty chasm.

narrowing

i found myself in the sliver of gold
between finger nail & skin. there is a 
a crawlspace underneath my parent's house
where the ghosts of cats are pressed down flat.
how thin can your night make you? i lay down
in front of a giant turning wheel
& threaten myself with less dimensions.
how do you know the solar system
isn't planning a fresh conspiracy tomorrow?
even my wrists whisper about me. i tell my dog
to go back to sleep & not worry about
the storm clouds forming above the bed.
grey deepens to black, the rain: purple 
& staining skin. i have all kinds of smudges 
across my body leftover from getting 
on my hands & knees & slipping beneath
the hood of the car. most stains
are perminant. i buy several extra shirts
incase this one gets destoryed. you can protect
very little in your life. everyone 
is thinner than the last time you saw them.
everyone is slicing oranges into slender medallions.
take circles & make lily pads. take a sheet of paper
& fold a raft to get you home. a crease
is where a life is born. mine was folded so tight
i scraped myself on entrance. a bee
flies out of a key hole. a girl opens
the fly of her pants & a centipede emerges.
it's all about waiting for the right moment 
to break the surface. a pike rests
with gnarled teeth just waiting 
for a wandering bluegill. you call me
in the middle of the night
& tell me something is squeezing you
so tight you can't see anything,
just a slit of light. i tell you 
to give in. we both wake up
on separate coasts as dried apricots.
the sun is always making excuses
but here we are as it slurps 
our sweetness. i just want a straw
shoved down my throat. i just want
to feed hummingbirds with my saddness.
that is not a humming bird though
that is a mosquito but then again
a body is a body. each full of light.
a rolling pin makes a painting
of all of us sitting in the living room
scrolling on our phones. there's nothing wrong
with turning your brain into a colander. 
all those holes to slip light through.

ache

this morning i felt a seed lodged 
in my palm. it ached like a torn 
length of rope. we are playing 
tug of war on the roof & one of my brothers
is falling of the edge. i am holding 
the rope & he is a bunch of cabbages in the yard.
the seed is twinkling 
in the bed of my thumb 
where there are cogs & filaments & wires. i water
the seed. i talk to it. i say
"you don't want to choose me
for your roots." there is sorbet 
in the freezer, huge tubes of it.
a spoon floats in the doorway 
begging to be plucked. spoons are
mostly stalkers. i give in & taste
just a tiny spoonful. the flavor
of a vacation-- one where i was too little
before i made lists each day. 
round rubber moon asking
for its own nightlight. i press
the handles of flashlights 
into the loose damp earth.
a forest of diminishing light
all up towards the moon. the moon is
less lonely now. what have you been doing
to keep your body company? i love
the persistence 
of orange rinds. a wheel 
rolls down the hill 
with out its mobile or it human.
whatever grows in my hand 
i hope it is gentle with me.
roots around bone around muslce
& tissue. i am picturing
a tomato vine crawling
up my arm. a raspberry bush 
spreading all the way down 
to my waist. telling a boy
to open his mouth & close his eyes 
as i place a ripe red fruit
on his tongue. a tongue is
a kind of beacon. all these boys
in the their towers & no one 
to save them. have you ever been
a boy with a seed soon to burst
from his palm? the starlight
is sharp tonight, little incissions 
in my blankets. a thousand tiny holes.
a wound is growing. the sun is
packaging himself in celophane 
so he will keep for another hundred-million years.
i hate when humans consider extinction 
as if it is an option. we are here
to open out mouths until 
our jaws turn to wings. i am here
to let the seed open & emerge
out of my skin. what will you steal 
from the farm?

portrait of my face throughout this day in june

i open the compact of my face.
here is everything soft & pink.
the mountains are made of powder
if you blow hard enough 
the world will be flat again. 
a mountain is born from the pressing together
of two hands.
when i put my hand up against yours
mine always turns into a lichin.
who is going to water the herbs
when i am gone? will the next tenant 
of this door know 
that this is a sage bush & this
is a friendly smidgen of lavendar?
i talk to the window & it clenches
it's teeth. when it rains tonight
someone will have left their car window 
a crack & the car will become 
a wonderful fish tank. the ghosts
of my goldfish whirl in the back yard
where their feather bones have long since
turned to soil. about my face,
it is almost unrecognizable. i am 
almost a dragon. i am almost 
a raccoon. my face is turning
on it's stage. we should pick strawberries
before all the green is drown.
i put strawberries where my eyes should be.
swelling red. tiny seeds squirming
in their seats. i walk in the field
& it's full of gnats & thin-legged insects.
i walk faster to escape them. 
some of them are sunflower seeds 
& i can't wait for them to just nestle
in the dirt. in the mirror 
my face has mandibles. it has
antenae. it has tusks. what creature
is the light making? we have little control
over what we see. of course,
i could spend every day 
with calcite instead of eyes. i pluck out
my sharp teeth & put them under my pillow.
a little pile of knives. who are you taking
to sit on the biggest red rock?
not me, that is alright. i will be here
with a chisel, trying to find
my cheek bone. i will be here
guarding a singular door 
with nothing notable on the other side.
strawberries are looming. a shark 
is in the fish tank car. pouring rain.