dandelion hair i'm here to tell you all of my dandelion wishes & that way i won't have to ever know if they'll come true or not-- a secret is the kind of thing that bites a hole in your pocket-- it rests the size of a dime or jupiter-- a gas planet full of red eyes & storms-- does it count if your brother helps you blow off all the seeds? & where do they go to hide themselves where their wish-bodies can take root & grow more wishes for more little boys with knee-hole jeans there will be more-- there will always be more heads to wish on-- hold me by the neck-- the way you would a de-thorned rose-- blew my hair off into the back yard i'll grow--i'll grow i'll grow wishes the size of evergreen trees & laugh golden & everyone will have believed that i was a flower or a great planet yanking moons from the cosmos & keeping them in my pocket-- heavy as a handful of dimes when i was little i used to wish on the dandelions that god would show himself to me-- i told him that he could be anything-- a morning dove-- a fast gust of wind-- in church i would look at the oil wick flicker of the candles & i would ask him to blow them out-- blow out the fires for me to blow the storms off the forehead of jupiter & god laughed the lawn full of dandelions so that i could keep wishing-- god sat under the street lamp outside on the curb & he spoke a language spun only by august nights-- he spoke into my window & left the glass foggy-- i drew a heart in the mist-- oh & then when i was older-- when i was older enough to love you i blew the faces off dandelions to ask if we could hold onto each other's hair & even as i asked i saw you turning-- cheeks flushing white-- we will all inevitably turn back into wishes-- grow wild & fearless & yellow in our parents backyards the wind comes & the wind comes off jupiter-- a jingling handful of moons in its pocket she is so full of secrets that we'll all lose our hair-- wish hard on every strand -- sit down with me-- lay under the warmth of the street lamps-- i want to tell you all my dandelion wishes-- you don't have to tell me yours but if you did i would listen & keep them from blowing away in the wind shape in my pocket your strands of yellow hair & the solar system
Uncategorized
09/29
Where do deleted pictures go? i select a handful of pictures of me & you-- you don't love me anymore but you did in this picture-- i kiss your cheek-- the world is made of pixels i turn-- i turn i turn to kiss your cheek-- we are made of lights i needed more space on my phone so i let us go-- & now i can't remember what necklace i was wearing or if your hair was wet from a shower did it smell like lavender or rosehips? i follow them (the pictures i deleted) i trace their foot steps up the beach in Wildwoof it's October & the mist off the ocean is cool the sunset is full of leaves i dip my feet in the water where the foot prints end i ask some bird watchers if they've seen a handful of pictures that i deleted off my iphone & they seem puzzled as if they've never tracked a photograph before i keep walking i go under the surf-- breath salt water & check the bellies of the horseshoe crabs-- their ancient bodies-- their blue blood they haven't seen my pictures i go to the stream-- over turn stones-- speak to crayfish (who all find humans to be quite irrational to be hunting so desperately for an image of themself) Narcissus narcissus they whisper i tell the crayfish it's more than that it's a memory-- it's a memory i forget how it felt to be so full of light bulbs-- so full of birthday cake icing how did you get me to eat a whole slice of the cheesecake moon? fresh black berries in our hair oh i loved you sitting on the back step night falls like an armful of books on my desk i double check behind library cards-- between flyleaf pages-- all the places i would hide i look up briefly & there is a new moon i stand up to ask God if he keeps them & i'm surprised when he drops down a rope ladder for me to climb up up there every cloud is buzzing with my old pictures-- gummy worm smiles ice cream sundaes blurry foot ball game lights my head rested on your chest a bright caterpillar with a map of the stars written on his back the angels sort-- carry box after box-- pouring them to make up the clouds he (in his sweater & corduroy pants) points to a box sitting alone the picture of us is on top i'm not wearing a necklace your hair smells like lavender
09/28
cat's cradle you loved me last night how i wanted how i always wanted-- you cupped me in your hands like a firefly or a toad-- soft skin & faint street lamp gentle & irrevocable-- no part of me could ever have escaped you-- & you told me that the telephone wires were the biggest lie-- that they were god playing cat's cradle with the cords-- threading his fingers in & out-- look it's the Eiffel tower-- the witches broom oh the cat's cradle the cat's cradle you slept with me in & we pulled out the telephone wires to listen to everyone's phone calls-- oh no-- not like the NSA-- we listened like god listens to the thighs of the crickets when night falls on all of earth at once-- when he slips the sun into his back pocket like a round golden watch & he listens to everything-- he hums along to our ticking-- the clock hands in our throats & no we're not gods but we have the telephone wires to listen to & we have our bodies hanging above it all-- your skin on mine is electric-- reach over will you & rinse off the moon in the sink? let's pretend it's new years & bang pots & pans in the driveway-- wake up the neighbors & tell them we decided that it's a new year-- it's a new year you will love me how i wanted to be loved-- hands cupped around firefly body flickering like the faint street lights tangled in his cat's cradle
09/27
finger paint love me there would never be enough photographs of us so i took to finger painting-- set easels around my bed room-- i made us oranges & yellows-- ketchup reds & deep spear mint evergreens-- we grew the kind of green you pull from the throat of the ocean-- the kind that kisses aquamarine i painted our lips with my thumbs-- used my knees to draw cheek bones-- my toes traced your jawline these bodies are tools of color-- dipped my shoulders sky blue to roll over the clouds-- lay here in bed with me-- let's paint each other into sunsets-- bruised sunsets maroon scabbing dusk-- i fell in a calliope of fingers-- made the sign of the cross on your forehead in cobalt blue-- wipe off your sins on the back of your hand-- finger paint me how you want-- how do you want to remember the curves of my body? fill me full of yellow-- smear me brown & black-- leave enough white on the canvas space to sleep in-- when the sun trickles in the window to pour over bodies we can crawl into the dark quiet of a camera-- the cove where color & light are stolen to make memories on the other side of the lens it's quiet-- moss & must kiss my neck in this deliberate dark-- rub my lips off on your tongue-- kiss me deep enough to fill your body with mine-- paint yourself with the the colors no one has known the ones deep down in me bone's corridors i want your to finger paint love me there's no light here-- there's only our bodies & god
09/26
What's wrong with your voice? i took scissors to radio tongues-- opened my mouth wide enough to swallow the record player-- the disk skip skip skips in my throat i open-- i unhindge my jaw wide enough to let out the calls of hundreds of birds-- there's the whistle of the black-capped chickadee-- the trill of the pine warbler-- the wail of the common loon-- an uncontrollable laughter falls out on the carpet in a burst of black speckled feathers i'm homesick for a voice alone in my room i sing the one song i know in italian i remember my voice teacher telling me to throw the high notes out the top of my head through the ceiling-- they always got tangled-- beak & claw thrashing-- smack against the ceiling fan-- i sing italian words-- i sing them wrong-- they get knotted on the ladder rungs of my throat-- Spesso vibra per suo gioco Spesso vibra per suo gioco i don't translate-- i make up a meaning for the song-- i say this song is about a dead lover & my voice teacher says that not every song is about dying but i think it is-- especially if it's in italian-- i practice over & over sitting here-- throwing my voice at the ceiling until there's none of it left i open my mouth & speak static & gravel i cut out newspaper headlines-- swallow them i'm making a paper machete voice i've been your ventriloquist-- i've song soprano & followed along in a hymnal-- i sing ave ave ave maria-- maria give me the call of a magpie if i can't sing away my tongue-- i'll take the scissors to it-- snip out my teeth-- my tongue piece by piece-- plant them in the back yard & wait with my mouth closed & filling with feathers-- red blood feathers-- i'm waiting for my teeth to grow trees & in the trees i'll spend my day catching birds & asking them to chirp to warble to sing to thrash-- spit their words into the back of my mouth what's wrong with my voice? it's in assembly-- piece by piece i'm building radio tongue-- bird call i break through the ceiling
09/25
our daughters were hurricanes cut your sneakers down from the telephone wires run down the center of noble street with me-- balance on the double yellow lines-- if we run fast enough we can lose these bodies-- if i didn't have this body i would have the sky & the melting polar ice caps-- let's run up there & down there tell them to stop this none sense-- tell them that there's nothing to cry over that there's never been anything to cry over-- we'll put a blue ice packs on their foreheads & say you're burning up you're burning up with a fever of 99.7 i stayed home from elementary school & my father dropped goldfish crackers into chicken noodle soup taught me how to swim-- taught me how to let myself melt-- he told me the polar bears are melting & breaking off into the sea-- & all the while the news reports warned that our daughters were becoming hurricanes-- they were tying their sneakers together & tossing them over the telephone wires on noble street-- they were outrunning their bodies & dispersing into the grass as morning dew-- oh i've always wanted to trade my skin to become a morning fog headlights shout through me i wrote a letter to the ice caps & told them to swallow their tears like i learned to swallow my own-- paper cup by paper cup their bodies gained force up east coast-- swirled & knotted into themselves-- she screamed with a force of 80 mph & trees un-clenched their fists from the soil & the sand oh our daughter maria what had we done to you to turn you into a cyclone-- was your mother so jealous that she let herself melt into the sea? when i'm done running there will be no such thing as snow & the earth will be made of water & we will all be able to float i was the daughter that plucked the eye of the storm out of her grandmother's jewelry box-- a glittery brooch pinned to my chest by the time i hit land i was a hurricane-- i pulled my sneakers down from the telephone line & ran
09/24
anthony i think i'm still in love with a boy named anthony who sat next to me in the second grade-- we both agreed that allosaurus is much better than T-Rex even though everyone thinks T-Rex is cooler-- we compared book-sale catalogs & we'd both circled Jurassic Attack! the cover with a velociraptor leaping out of the page-- we agreed that we would be friends he told me he was moving to minnesota & i asked how far a drive that was & he said only a few states away & i said i would visit him-- i imagined states were as far apart as towns or even as close as sidewalk squares i built him a farm house with wooden floors he left the porch light on for me & we caught lighting bugs he lived right over the railroad tracks in fleetwood because i didn't remember what was over there-- i assumed it could be minnesota i said i would have my dad drive me because he doesn't mind road trips & maybe we could read Jurasic Attack! together i asked if anthony had a play station & he said he was getting one someday so i said i'd bring over dad's dinosaur video game-- the game with the purple-haired girl all dressed in leather-- i told him that i liked it for the dinosaurs-- not for the girl even though you had to play as her-- he made me pinky swear i would visit-- he told me that it made him feel better to know he'd still have a friend-- that night when i went home to our row house on main street i walked outside with my dad i asked him to turn off the street lamps so that the moths would quit burning themselves he said he'd try & we walked up & down the sidewalk taking out each light bulb-- i told him that i wanted to visit my friend in minnesota & he just held our blue plastic sand bucket full of light bulbs-- they clattered together-- i asked where the moths would escape to without all the street lamps & my dad said they'd probably end up high as the moon-- knocking it from the top shelf-- he said minnesota was also on the top shelf-- & i told him we should knock it down-- break it into a thousand pieces like our blue & yellow cereal bowls on the kitchen floor & all the moths smacked on the moon -- got lost lost in the stars & didn't come down until the spring we floated the light bulbs in the creek & they lit up-- little lanterns bobbing slowly away-- i asked if light bulbs could ever be stars & my dad said maybe but only if we could pick up the pieces of minnesota on the kitchen floor-- i said that maybe the light bulbs would make it there-- to my friend & he would know i hadn't forgotten dear anthony do you still like allosaurus? it's okay if you don't & it's okay if you never got a play station-- dear anthony did you get my light bulbs? were they still bright in minnesota? minnesota right over the railroad tracks in your great big farm house with wooden floors & a porch covered in lightning bugs-- if you read this take minnesota off your top shelf & mail it to me
09/23
for want of a wolf for want of a wolf she wore a red thong & shaved her legs in the creek-- nicked her heel & blood trickled up stream with maroon & burnt orange leaves grandmother's house was a highway-- a back seat-- a crystal jar of strawberry hard candies-- grandmother's house was a wooden pew & a stained glass window & a mug full of hot milk for want of a wolf she stuck her hand out the car wind to catch racing air her mother told (her like all mothers tell their red children) to never hitchhike-- to stay in the backseat & never wear thongs because they make you a slut for want of a wolf she opened the back door roll out onto hot asphalt highway-- stuck out her thumb for want of a wolf she wore a red thong & the maple trees were so embarrassed that they got naked for her-- spilled their leaves-- wrote love poems on each one before they fell-- wrote sonnets about her razor burn legs wrote elegies wrote prayers for want of a wolf she hitchhiked to grandmother's house-- her grandmother's house past 7/11 past Limerick Diner & past tall blinking radio towers sending distress signals to God-- God who fills his ears with clouds for want of a wolf she ate cake from her basket-- drank the wine & bled purple closed her eyes & day dreamed about what fangs would feel like against her pink skin & her grandmother was very very strange like all grandmothers oh what big eyes, ears, mouth you have oh what big erotic teeth-- all the better to eat me with-- the inside of a wolf is warm-- is quiet & throbbing & full of so much blood for want of darkness for want of heartbeat for want of a lonely body she rested she thought of radio towers & how she had never been good at praying she thought for the first time of her father & wondered if he had ever been a wolf or a highway or a basket full of wine & cake the hunter's axe is always the first one responsible for blood for want of a wolf he cut open her grandmother but he saw she was wearing a thong so he filled them both with stones-- the girl & the wolf river stones-- smooth & heavy each one down their throats like lead tongue kisses he weighed them down so they could never move from grandmother's house her house past 7/11 & red light radio towers & God pretended not to listen they lay statues with erotic teeth & her red red thong
09/22
when heaven was the other side of a cloud it was one of those nights where i was the only person left on earth & headlights drove themselves-- blared in the driveway-- it was one of those nights where i had to coax my body to stay & not wander off to a cloud-- it was one of those nights i spent trying not to think so much about dying & thinking how everything would be better if the rapture would have happened-- we all could have gone up together-- i want to go back to a time when heaven was as close as the other side of a cloud-- i don't want to die but when i look at the confused september street all i can think about is how the sidewalk will look covered in snow-- how it's inevitable that it will be again covered in snow i like to look at snow but i don't like the way it tucks us all in-- tells us to whisper-- snow says speak in hushed voices get out of bed late & turn your body into an angel-- flap your wings-- backwards fly into a headlight-- i believe in coming back to summer-- not because it's better than snow but because it's most lonely of all the seasons-- summer cuts her hair & no one notices-- summer shaves the front lawns of her knees-- she asks me to hold her hand & walk up our street again-- she says she feels like she doesn't have a right to be so bold in september-- i kiss her under a street lamp like how you're supposed to-- i'm watching her decrescendo-- her arms will start at night-- cold-- she will grow frost under her fingernails she'll shake her bones loose in maple trees-- paint maroon & mandarin leaves on sidewalk & autumn will never love her like i did-- since if was seven i've been fascinated by frozen lakes-- i stood on the edge of the pond in fleetwood park while my father explained that the ice wasn't thick enough to stand on-- i wanted to walk on it anyway-- like a sidewalk-- like a sidewalk to fall into-- i watched TV shows about little kids who slipped through the ice & were rescued only i didn't want to be rescued-- i wanted from the bottom of my bones to feel cold-- to feel the stillness of the bottom of the pond-- a ceiling of ice & heaven sitting above with her headlights
09/21
potato roll heart girl i sold my heart for a potato roll-- broke it apart into pieces to toss to ducks & blue gills-- hungry creek water licked clean my feet i slathered my heart in peanut butter & ate alone on a bench for sixth grade lunch & Miss Brett asked me why i was sitting by myself i said i hadn't noticed-- i squished my heart into little balls of bread to skewer on our fish hooks-- dropped the line into the stream my father taught me how keep my finger gentle against the string-- to listen with my whole body for the mouth of a fish he ate bits of bread before casting out-- we drank rootbeer from bottles the way everyone should & every now & then we'd both say we felt a nibble-- a tug-- neither of us caught a fish neither of us wanted to i've been thinking about all the times i was so accidentally beautiful-- a fat ten year old girl who thought to put an orchid in her hair-- bare foot-- soil-kneed-- potato roll heart girl peeling herself apart for a fish she hasn't met yet-- a girl in flat black shoes-- cutting her hair to make a bird's nest dropping maple whirligigs from her window she flies in a downward motion-- she eats lunch alone-- her father fishes beside her & neither of them catch a thing
Robin Gow 