paper plate 

i set the day on a paper plate,
it's a good day, really really ripe day 
with skin all soft & mushy.

i slice the day & tell it
to stop crying, that it's just 
a day & there's a whole bowl 
of days on the table.

i put my parents on a plate &
i carry it to the living room,
setting it on the arm of the sofa.

they lie down like slices of peach,
nectar-dripping & thin.
the tv is black & quiet but i
watch it while i eat them,

holding out another paper plate
i ask you if you'll get on it
with me. i'm small & microwavable
& so are you & so is anyone at
this time of night

we clasp hands & look at
each other, the yellow pirouette 
of being spun on the microwave's 
glass plate

soft & softer, string-cheese knees
melting & leaving us looking
up at the ceiling fan,

at least we don't have to worry
about where we have to when
we're laying like this

another plate i stack with 
knives & another with spoons

another plate i put all
my book shelves & another 
my grandmother's grave is plotted on.

i leave flowers on the plate too. 

& then of course we have to
throw them away. the trash 
is a wonderful kind of museum.

it's big & white in my kitchen

i crawl inside so all
the plates can get spilled over me.

i tuck myself small &
the plastic lining become embryo,
i'm a yolk, dip your finger in me.

eating leftovers by myself
i remember that you were on
the plate too, so i dig & dig & dig

to find you, rotted & sweet,
the cheese getting a crust from
being left out too long,

but i still take bites out of you,
after  all we went to the hassle of
getting out a paper plate.

your last wish was for me to try
& fit all the planets on one &
i tried not to laugh at you because
that's so easy.  

god does that every single night,
he rings my doorbell, wipes
his shoes before entering &
swipes a paper plate from 
my counter so that he can pick

each star & planet out of the sky
& throw them in the trash with us
when the night is over
it takes them all day with the sun
to grow back

i crawl out of the trash,
offering you a hand. we shower
together. 

i put the morning 
on a paper plate

it's almost too big to fit.

all of them,
all the saints, 

they can all come out 
on the 1st of november 

they come dressed up as each other

st. joseph as st. lucy laughing with 
two grapes on a plate as eyes,

st. clare as st. francis,
with a fake parrot glued 
to her shoulder

st. francis as st. denis,
holding a papier-mâché severed head
full of cherry throat lozenges 

st. catherine as the other 
st. catherine, everyone pretends that they
can tell them apart but they're so similar 
that their costumes don't make
much of a difference

the end of the day 
is the best part

all the saints go house
to house martyring themselves,
even the ones that didn't have
a chance to be martyred in their
real lives 

don't worry,
it's not morbid,

they go up in a poof 
of smoke as they do,

the smoke smells like
cotton candy & comes in
all sorts of colors

i was excited when the door bell rang,
outside, standing st. leo,
my brother's favorite saint

i wanted to invite him in,
but i knew what he was here for

he put a water gun to his 
forehead & pulled the trigger

& BAM!

On growing

stuffed animals are filled 
with meringue & other sweet clouds.
i've had the same stuffed teddy bear,
we've come to know each other,
talking late into the night
about our bodies 

when i was 8
we would share clothes,
my red zip-up hoodie, my scratchy 
wool gloves, my knit winter hats.
sometimes she goes into my closet,
wistfully wrestling with 
my monster clothing.
she weeps because i'm big &  
she wants to be big too.

she sits up now at the foot 
of my bed,
her blueberry bead eyes
blinking in the light from
the garage

i tell her "go to sleep beary"

she stands up & tells me that
she needs to grow too.

in the kitchen she opens her
mouth full of candy corn
& knitting needle teeth, she
growls like i've never heard her,

swallowing handfuls of granola  
&  cups of coffee

i watch from the doorway & feel
myself getting smaller & smaller

beary chews wildly, she says
this is what adults eat right?
as she snaps another protein bar
in half-- as the coffee pot spills
over & onto the floor

in a small body i totter over
& hold onto her leg.

i inspect my fingers to
find them soft & apricot-like,
my night shirt, huge, all
the way down to my knees

beary picks me up & asks
are you hungry?

i play along & let her 
make me warm milk on the stove
it makes her happy

i tell her that this has
gone on too long 
& i take her to the bathroom
where she open her mouth
& lets me pull out handful 
after handful of stuffing,
opening the window to let
them out to be clouds again,

as i do i grow again
& i cry because the milk 
was sweet & the kitchen's a mess
& she fits in my arms
& i carry her back to bed,

i tuck her in & say
sleep

hot peppers 

i noticed a short hot pepper plant
sprouting all on its own by my window.
over night the plant grew, it's changing 
emitting the sound of crackled knuckles,
the twisting of a spine. i sat up 
in bed to see the plant coming into view,
it's fruit like red & orange fingers
tapping on the glass. i asked the plant
what it wanted with me at this hour
& it responded by continuing to drum 
on the glass, only, now more rapidly.
i said that i have no use for hot peppers
& it reminded me the time we stood in
your back yard, the rows of hot pepper
plants that grew everywhere you walked,
your footprints full of acid. i opened
my mouth for you & you put one on my tongue.
a piece of the sun perched on every small
grainy seed & my teeth shone 
like glow sticks in your bedroom.
the sun, dipping itself into a glass
of milk. i remember your laughter 
like the smacking together of stones,
the tapping of fingers on a window. 
all those years i was convinced that 
eating the peppers was my own idea 
but there you were, pointing a long
red one towards my lips, begging me to open.
i lift the window because i know
the hot peppers will find their
way inside anyway. i tell them to have
a seat anywhere & they spread, 
they caress my skin & it burns,
their acid & oils seeping through flesh.
i lay out as they touch me, they laugh
only this time with the sound of 
wind chimes, the ones that hung on
your back porch. i hope that wherever
you are that someone has fed your 
hot peppers. i don't mean this our
of revenge, but out of necessity.
i bathe in milk to try & wash out
the sting but the peppers find their
way to the bathroom too. i say,
please stop, it's time to stop.
but they can't help it, they don't
know any better. they blink like
christmas lights. they are so happy 
to have found a home. they love me
deeply & furiously, did they climb
out of your mouth? how long have
the peppers been watching us &
do you chew them as you eat?
eventually the honeymoon phase fades
& the peppers become more docile,
i rub them & it scalds my skin
but eventually they swell, becoming
bell peppers, green & yellow & orange.
i slice them in the kitchen &
eat them in slivers like ribs. 
have they found you yet, then
or was it just me?

sculpture

i want to know if i threw myself
like a comet to the bottom
of the ocean if the silt & 
the sediment could cover me
just right, like a body of 
the borealopelta dinosaur, 
tripping endlessly deeper into
our bottomless ocean. 
a miner found the fossil, 
deep in the throat of 
the millennium mine in alberta 
canada: skin & scales & all. 
the most preserved
of all dinosaurs. when he
encountered it, did he touch it
to see if it was still alive?
it's body a time-sculpture,
the fingers of a reptile god 
digging in the layers of rock
for dead animals to make 
into heavy pieces of art.
i think i would like all
that time to think, covered 
in quiet, feeling my own
body getting heavier, the surface
etching my body, a stone photograph.
i would write poetry in my head,
spinning un-catch-able words,
did the borealpelta do the same?
his language getting harder 
with each passing century.
did he write of his body?
of the fall to the bottom?
i want to curl up down
there with him, feel the ocean
gently peel away, leaving
us as objects to be discovered
by a miner, the colors of
our skin bleeding out, finding
their way to the autumn leaves
in some other area of the world.
the scientists will ask us
to open our mouths so they
can know what our last meals were.
both of us have stomachs 
full of stones. oatmeal too,
baby carrots & a silver spoon.
i go to the museum where you
lay, i open your mouth & crawl
inside your body. there's a whole
ocean in here full of green water
& stalagmites dripping like teeth.
i hoped this would wake you up
& you could tell of about
everything you dreamed in
those years at the bottom,
under everything. you don't stir.
i touch the remnants of your ribs,
take me with you
beautiful beautiful beautiful.

the life cycle

late in the night i 
come apart amphibially,
a pile of frogs eggs,

each one heartbeat throbbing 
in the sheets.  

i want you to

put your hands in me.

a jar of apricot jam.

soft planets. the embryo eyes
flicking, 

the world of commas.

all night the life cycle goes
& you watch as i become 

a floor full of tadpoles,
thrashing & gill gasping,

put me in your mouth
to carry me to the bathroom,

all my bodies swimming

i taste like rain.

i would do the same for you.
don't swallow, not yet at least.

let the frogs go free though,
all over the house
& back to wet themselves
in the tub. 

i just need to use my legs,

starting with just one limb
at a time, their growth like 
pulling carrots from dirt,

don't watch me, this is personal

then again i watch you 

getting dressed, the way

you roll up your socks 
before pulling them on

don't you ever want to spend
the night like this?

it's only because i can't sleep

i promise 

i want to say i'm not usually
like this but i am

i'm a wet merry-go-round body

& at some point all the fronts 
break like jars of marbles

back into eggs.

the whole process takes about an hour.

i'm sorry.

i'm sorry i really am this isn't
your job.

you pick me up & take me back to bed,
piling the eggs up,

get some rest before 
i get up again,

wrap your arms around them,

soft & warm &
quiet

go to sleep now
you whisper

& the first egg swells,
the tadpoles coming back,

spilling on the wood floor.

i go all night. 

barefoot on the porch 
i find her,
hair following her like a wedding train.

st. clair tells me she can see the ghosts
of people's hair & that mine is so long
that it goes down the basement steps.

i rub her feet till she can feel them again.
she also doesn't eat meat & so 
we have microwave veggie burgers;
chickpea & pesto. 

her hair keeps growing & she tells
me that she hates it, that she hates
how long she's let it grow.

the more upset, the more it swells--
great curls & loops & knots.

i tell her that i want to help her
cut it off & she says that she cut it
first for god 

after she left she wanted it to grow
so that someone new might want to 
love her.

No one new came,

hair monstrous & un-tamable.

she kneels over the waste basket
& i get out the hair clippers,
the gentle buzzing across scalp.
as i shave her hair it turns into milk,

droplets in the sink
just like mine on the floor
of the salon.

the first time i shaved my hair short
it felt like peeling all the boys' fingers 
off of my skull, all the times 
men had yanked, 
made leashes of me,
turned fatty & liquid

we finish &
her head is bristly,
an early june peach.

i tell her she needs to shave 
mine too, closer this time,

i tell her to take off the top
layer of skin,

plum red & vein,

she digs pits from my skull,

so many for one fruit,
her fingers stained & bloody.

she keeps apologizing as she

drops them in the trash.

i ask about my ghost hair
& she says no to worry about it
so i ask again & she admits
that it's so long that it 
dips in the ocean, fondles 
the sea weed on the north shore

closing my eyes
i feel the light pull

he holds me 

i say 
i want it off-- 
i want it off 

fly

i get off the train at
an un-named station

i lied, i eat the name,
break off each letter like
a graham cracker. i didn't
want you to know where i'd gone.

there's these huge tall buildings
with rows & rows of windows 
i'm convinced no one lives inside.

climbing ivy draped fences & 
over rubber tire graveyards
i get to an empty street--

the watch on my wrist turns 
over in protest, plucks off 
its own eye-lash arms

so i find the entrance to
one of those buildings
& i go up to the very top 
floor, because where else
would i go?

each room with a white 
air conditioner still holding
on to the window-- i push them
out in the hopes that they'll
sprout wings when they fall

the first one thuds below
& i'm sorry for asking so much
of it but it's going to
be winter soon & the air conditioners
need to adapt, this is tough love

i'm reminded of the time that
we traded stories of the times
we felt most cold, i told you 
i was on the ferry from staten island
& you said you were sitting in your jeep
in january waiting for it to warm up

if i was there i would have 
wrapped myself around you
a scarf or a knit hat--

i don't give up, each room 
thrusting the air conditioners out,
saying

come on, don't you want to fly?

they're tired, i assume, or lonely,
considering there's no one living there

down below the wounded ones crawl
on all fours, they speak gravelly 
to each other

they trade tall tales about
the people who lived in their rooms

all lies, beautiful lies,
the best kinds of lies

finally, in the last room on
the floor i thrust one out 
& the wings come, they're made of 
saran wrap & months of swallowed
dust particles

i ask the air conditioner
to take me with it, but it's already
gone, it weeps as it flies
over the others 
(or maybe that's
just the condensation)

i don't tell you about any of this.
at the train stop i tell you
the same story again about
being cold & red on the ferry,
the wind made of broken
graham crackers.

when you fall asleep that night
i pick you up & throw you 
out the window,

you don't sprout wings. 

i turned my eyes into marbles
so i could toss them, let them roll 
to the front of the train car,

smacking into each other.

is it so wrong to want to be lonely?

i needed to look somewhere other than at us.

& on the walk home i 
thought about how when we love anyone 
we try to make humans out of them,

wait till they're sleeping 
so they're more willing, kneel 
over their body & steal their 
joints for door hinges

plucking out their marbles 
& burying them in the backyard 

so we can say-- only i really 
see you, only me only me

i wipe my brown irises off 
in the train station bathroom sink,
blow drying them to put back in--

you looked beautiful you know that?

i want to make you swallow
the marbles so i can look inside

i imagine you full of 
sugar caverns & slides

what kind of human do you
see in me?

& without this 

what kind of human do i see me as

i think i'm coming apart on
the page

all my blood replaced
with wording

i do it exceptionally 
well, i do it so it feels like hell

that's Sylvia talking

i chew the marbles myself,
they pop like grapes 

& i curl up

a handful of something,

my insides are all train stations

a ball-pit full of eyes,

too many too see anything

doorbell & drywall 

when the pipes crack in the walls
you ask me what monsters move through them.

i find a stethoscope & press it to the drywall, 
the house shivering under it's cold touch.

that's when the doorbell rings & rings
& rings & rings. i tell you we don't

need to get it. that it's nothing.
outside on the porch i'm standing there

in a halloween costume. don't let me in
i'm too old for all of this. there's a

great white shark, pacing, lurking in 
the pipes, that's more pressing, don't

answer the door. all this swimming,
the banging, a school of eels all squeezing,

stuffing themselves in the arteries
of the house. a whole ocean. we sit

listening & you whisper that you'd
like to go inside-- in side the pipes,

live tight as corridor. door bell again.
stay put, i say & i got tell myself to 

go home & put on normal clothing.
when i come back you've already gone 

i hear pacing, walls warping with 
your weight in the pipes. you run

from sea monsters, the basement kraken
with it's beak biting at your heels.

i come after you through the faucet that's
always dripping, but before i do

i stick my finger down my own throat 
to ring myself like a doorbell,

reaching, i turn myself inside out, 
my halloween costume, all gill & vein. 

there, the water is quiet now. i find you 
knotted in kelp. i kiss you till 

you come loose, the bubbles becoming
tuna as they come out your mouth.

we spend the night there in the pipes
& tell each other stories of our old

halloween costumes. the doorbell keeps
ringing, but we learn to ignore it.