if sleeping beauty didn't wake up 

we would say
what kind of girl's body
doesn't open by the mouth?
she had to have been
a whore or some kind
of night stepping wanderer--
what kind of girl doesn't
open like a hinge?
what kind of girl sleeps
through the want
of a prince?
& he would walk away
like all boys do when
they don't get
what they set out for--
across the kingdom 
the story of a prince
so wronged by a sleeping
woman would become
the story they told their girls
before they fell asleep--
to not be frigid & slumber
like the sleeping princess
who didn't know how
to wake up from her mouth--
who didn't know that on
her body was mapped a
boy's plot line
& awake in bed the girls
would fear sleep itself--
they would share stories
stories by the moon &
ask if each other had ever failed
to wake up in the morning--
but some girls 
some girls 
would want to find her--
they would take backpacks
as if they were going to 
school-- fill them with maps
& notebooks--
they would rip their stocking 
on briers & carry their slippers
in their hands & they would 
make their way over
the mountain ridge
at the far end of the kingdom--
following the persistent
blooming of hydrangeas like
the forest itself was blushing--
there in the depths of the trees 
she would lay-- wrapped
in vine & branch-- a body
embraced by ivy-- blooming
with flowers all around
her-- her face a tulip bulb &
the girls would stand in
horror & relief to know
that it was true--
that they didn't have to
wake up-- that there
was a body whose sleep
was so deep that not
even a boy could force her
to rise--
between themselves they
made up tales of what she had been
dreaming of all this time--
they said that she tamed dragons--
at she was a witch & a goddess
& a mother & a girl &
one of the them said that 
maybe she dreamed of a
princess who would come & kiss
her & she wouldn't have to
wake up to be in love with her--
they would leave offerings at
her feet-- handfuls of smooth
stones they had collected when
they crossed the brook &
dandelions which can always
serve as approximations for
a flower--
they would kiss her feet
among the brush &
they would leave without
another word-- back over the mountain
ridge back to homes &
cottages where they would sew back
& not sew the holes in their
stockings & sleep heavy &
so full of dreams 
that at times they felt
as if maybe just maybe
they would not wake up--

the facebook birthday phenomenon

hello,
it was nice to see
you 
& you're looking
well 
& by 'looking well'
i mean looking different
than when i knew you but 
still the same &
when i say it was nice
to see you i mean it
was nice to scroll
through your pictures on
facebook--

if i go back far enough
you'll be wearing the
same neon green head band
that you used to
in fifth grade or maybe 
the knee-high converse
that i was jealous of
even though the zipper
on the back would
get caught sometimes &
you'd be the last to 
get changed from gym
class--

we pretend the facebook
birthday phenomenon
is impersonal-- an electronic
notification that someone
that you have once
known or still know or
know only vaguely 
was born this day--
their name gift wrapped
on your dash board--
but 
this is when
you open them up  again--

you feel 
the way her voice sounded--
it reverberates off the
walls of your room--
you remember
the way she used to
bite her hair
& how Mrs. Hess in second
grade had told her it was
a nasty habit--

this time you go 
to his birthday party
even though you don't
know what sixth grade
boys want as presents
but what does anyone want
as a present anyway?

i want to be remembered--

when i get notifications
about your birthday i 
think of everything i have
ever wanted to say to you--

i start typing on your
timeline-- i write about how
you said something that
made me smile
during an afternoon
study hall & i wasn't supposed
to be listening to your conversation
but i'll never forget 
what you said about wishing
he would love
you like he did in the summer
& about how your mother
found an empty beer bottle
in your room

& i'm sorry that i never
said something to you when
i noticed you crying in the bathroom
we've all been crying in a bathroom 

& i want to come meet
you again-- we can get coffee
& catch up about the
conversations we never had & 

i'll tell you that i always wanted to
know how it was you
braided your hair like a fish tail--
go ahead you can ask why
i cut all of mine off--
 
there are so many people
that i know as a stack of
changing profile pictures--
in the latest one you're
wearing sunglasses & tilting your head 
you're submerged in an instagram filter--

let's turn black & white--
sun-stain our faces--
live between the months of our
bodies--
turn younger & older
& younger again--
do you ever look
through my photos?
i'd love it if you did--

instead of all that
i delete 
everything i wanted
to say to you--
i rest the cursor over
the empty text box &
i write 
happy birthday :)

& now you know
what the means

a room of our own

this year i was going
to live alone
as all poets eventually should--
my room's 
on the second floor of
a house with a white nose
& a window that looks
out wistfully at
the parking lot--
i thought 
this is how we
all become writers--
like Emily who wrote
herself into a ghost & if
she could then
then so would i-- alone
in a room with mobiles of
words dangling from the
ceiling--
but then of course
i had thought of her so
she was there to stay--
she didn't knock nor
did i hear her come in--
i came home to find
Emily wearing 
her long white dress & rocking
back in my desk chair--
she was 
jotting down brief sonnets
in my green marble notebook--
she doesn't say much
she likes to eat finger sandwiches
& she said that she would 
do the wash every other
load--
i figured i could manage her
but then of course 
there's not just one
of us--
the next day
i made a cup of coffee & let
it set to cool & when i returned
Sylvia was there stirring it
with one of my tiny
silver spoons
Was this yours?
she asked innocently 
& took a seat in the corner
of the room on my bean bag chair--
i let her make the coffee now
she does it better &
sometimes when it's too
late to be writing
she'll stay up 
with me & tell me stories
of the city in the winter & i'll
fall asleep--
she'll pick me up like a little
girl & puts me into my bed--
& i admit i don't
know where they all sleep--
perhaps they become shadows or
they crouch in the closet--
they haven't stopped coming &
yesterday in the afternoon
Millay brought us a bag of
apples from the fruit carts on 
MacDougal Street--
we shared them all sliced up
& before we were finished
there came more & more &
Gwendolyn said that the world 
is at the window so
we all got up to look
& grab handfuls of headlights--
stuff the light into our
pockets & laugh at
the rush of it all--
this continued for weeks & even
Shakespeare's sister put
hung a row of Christmas lights
about my bed--
i told them yes-- yes i
need to be alone but don't
leave just yet--
tell me another story--
another sonnet on the back of
a napkin--
sleep here tonight & 
in the morning i'll make
the coffee & we'll
write something astounding 
about this room--

i'll be a man with
no ribs--

i picked myself
apart rib by rib
to rid my body of 
every remnant of you--
your commas your-- 
dried stems--
your tongue behind
my teeth--
you ate through
my mouth as if
my lips were the 
tight flesh of a
red delicious apple--
don't tell me 
about temptation--
next time
you want to share fruit
i'll be the snake & 
you can be eve
instead of god
like you always get to be--
i'll bite your ankles &
you can learn to wear my wounds
like i wear yours-- 
in the hollow
of my chest where
you once planted
a rib like the stalk
of a sunflower--
the bent neck of a cherry
blossom tree--
i am an april snow--
i could fall only in petals &
oh don't
we all want to know
when//if we will be missed 
& for how long
i want to know if you will ever
find a space within yourself
as vacant as where i dislodged
you from--
i have found other uses
for your ribs--
i stick them in the soil
behind my house--
one becomes an apple tree--
another, an empty
picture frame i
use to remember the shape
of my body when 
you stored a piece of
yourself inside me--
& i'll watch the cardinals
use those other ribs as
the base of their
nest & when their
children shed their 
downy feathers they'll drop
like petals or snow
& they'll know nothing about
what lengths boys
will go to own you--
i am your adam with no 
ribs-- your 
snake-forgiving brother
picking up
apples from the back yard--
i'm on my knees 
in the garden-- making
use of your bones--
i fill my chest with 
with branches & when
it snows in september
i'll collect the
feathers & send them to
you--

my windshield wipers stopped working
& the world filled up with water

maybe i won't sleep at all
& i'll get up from bed--
moth wing heart in my throat
& go outside in the
rain wearing only
my boxers & loose
black t-shirt--

last night when it rained 
my windshield wipers 
stopped working & i plunged
into the ocean-- witnessed
the storm turn into
a sea & i rolled down my
window to touch scale--
feel the thrum of a 
passing 
school of tuna fish--

i hoped that if the car filled
up with water that
i would at least
get to witness 
the great body of a hump-back whale
somewhere nearby-- looming
in the distance--
it's shadow a storm cloud--
a skyscraper 
with dwindling lights 
left on in a few offices 
as other people rejected their
the concept of sleep--

i'll just stay up all night &
barefoot in the parking lot
behind
my house i'll spit out
bottle caps & plant 
them in the hopes of attracting
my father--
he knows how to get me to
fall asleep--
he used to leave little piles
of his beer bottle caps
next to the rocking
chair while he waited for
me to fall asleep--

what's the use in sleeping
if the windshield wipers
aren't working & there's nothing
to see but water?

i can sit here all night
& watch flowers sprout
from the meandering brown & green 
glass bottles 
in the parking lot--

maybe i won't sleep at all
& i'll wake up
in a different bed 
in a different body-- much
older & maybe my shoulders will
ache & i'll wonder what
put the soreness in 
this body's muscle--
where do you feel your worry?
what color glass are
your knees?

when i drive at night
without windshield wipers
i drive slow & occasionally 
i'll pass someone on the
side of the road & they'll
resemble an eel-- a hood
pulled over their head &
i'll want to open
the door to my car & tell
them to get in-- tell them
that we'll
go where they're going--

that i want to know
what kind of ocean
they keep in their
wet shoes & if they've recently considered 
no sleeping & just
letting each day fall into
the next like rain
filling up the earth until
the whales crash into the 
sky scrapers & the street
lamps become only approximations
for stars--

the world is filling up--
the water is to 
the second story windows & oh 
what if i just stayed up 
another hour 
to watch--?

car riders to the car port 

we all knew there were
different ways of going home--
some children walked with their
siblings out the double brown
doors at the front of the school
& the crossing guards
conducted the cars around
them in a sort of symphony--
fifth graders in safety patrol
badges letting their minds
escape down the sidewalks--
take root in the cracks
of the cement--
where did you grown your
afternoons?
the of course the bus riders
separated by
their numbered & colored
bus & sat with their book bags 
in their laps while
a lady in the cafeteria 
called "blue-seventy-two"
& "yellow-four-ninety-eight"
& i was a young girl
with my father's haircut &
two mismatched chuck taylors
& a lunch box full of clouds--
i want to pick myself up 
in the car line today--
drive back eleven or so
years ago-- 
i'll pull up in my green
volvo & the 3rd grade teacher
mrs. bowman will ask
who i am & i'll explain that
i'm myself only about a 
decade older
when she gets in
the front seat
i'll tell her
she doesn't need to
wear a seat belt--
that today we're
going throw her spelling homework
out the window & 
read e. e. cummings & 
discover everything you
can do to a sentence--
pluck the periods out
of our chapter books--
plump blueberries
plinking in a steel bowl between
us-- i'll show her how
you can wear question marks
for earrings & for dinner
we can eat gas station doughnuts
& i'll ask her to tell
me about the boys she has crushes
on & how sometimes she
writes
their initials on the inside-cover 
of her math notebook--
i tell her to peel off their
names & drop them on
the backs of a dead leaves
in the stream-- 
i say that it's okay
to day dream about them--
let the water
tension keep their bodies afloat--
& sometimes it's okay to drown
in sweaty-hand elementary 
school love--
she asks if i ever got
to love someone & i tell her
i have & that you don't finish
loving people-- that you never
finish loving people
& that's why the leaves grow back
each year so we have more
vessels to drop in the creak
when we turn crimson & marmalade--
she gets tired early because
i forgot how early elementary
school children go to bed
& at nine she lays out 
on the bench in the park &
i pick her up like an infant--
put her glasses on the dash
board & i drive her back
to her rain forest bed room with
the rain sound machine pounding
on her windows--
i lay her in bed-- 
gently brush her
hair out of her face &
leave her
with a bowl of blueberries--
washed & ready to be used in
poems-- 
i leave her a notebook 
& tell her to fill the first
two pages & forget to write
more-- this is the process of
teaching words come home
to you at night--
i tell her that tomorrow
her father will pick her up
at the car port in his blue
jeep & she won't remember me
& the fifth grade safety 
patrol officers will break
free
into a rush down the sidewalks 
& her shoe laces will tie themselves--
oh girl with my father's hair cut &
a blue denim jacket--
keep your pockets stuffed 
with sweaty-palm love-- 
baptize yourself clean  
in the creek & pick up
the pages of spelling home work
we threw out the window--
kidnap the words from
their pages--
peel
the blue lines 
your the notebook
paper-- 
braid them into 
a cloud--

i bought a telescope 

i bought a telescope to use 
as a staircase-- 
it's the only way to
get there you know? 
you unscrew the
eyepiece 
& walk right
inside-- a corridor--
a passageway--
the back door
we were all missing
& it resembles the long
hall in my grandmother's 
apartment-- the one
with the cats lingering
at the far end or
maybe the hallway at 
my parent's house--
always too dimly lit
so that it makes you 
want to run through it--
race into the telescope
with me-- arms 
open-- unafraid of burning
up in the atmosphere--
let your body become space dust
& climb this aisle 
of stairs on all fours
as if you were a child again
going up to the attic to
discover card board boxes--
when we get there the moon
will be empty & we'll 
leave foot prints &
sign our names in the dirt so
that the next person to
walk up there will know
they are not alone & 
i'll have brought butterfly nets
& i'll hand one to you &
show you how easy it
is to catch the stars 
who wonder away 
from their constellation--
you can pinch them by the wings &
we'll set them back where 
they belong in
the sky--
connect the dots & invent
our own star-bodies--
i took the big dipper &
made it into a dragon's head because
that's what its always looked like
to me anyway--
we can sleep out here in
the tent & zipped 
inside it'll feel like
july & lightning bugs will
find the telescope hallway 
& become 
wall sconces-- flickering 
quiet candles--
i'll tell you how 
tomorrow we can climb to jupiter
& you remind me that it's a gas 
planet & i tell you that
part of the fun of a telescope
is pretending that everything
is only a staircase away &
you agree that we can take
a walk on jupiter even if
it is made of mostly helium--
we can steal rings from
saturn to ordain ourselves
& make little halos like
the ones the saints wear in
stained glass windows--
what is the night sky by a stained 
glass window so close
to shattering from 
one of our tossed baseballs--
you remind me that we have to go back
& i let you crawl back inside
first-- through the corridor
light by fireflies
we emerge
in the sun room of our parent's house--
the big bay windows gaping open--
full of street lamp &
blushing with 
the passing headlines 
down the road outside 
the house--
we put back on the eye piece 
& rush-- race
down the hall-- the one 
that's always too dimly lit

i grew like moss

when you left i grew like
moss-- between
the cracks in the sidewalk--
soft caress & handfuls of
cement--
when you left my body
went green-- 
i took the left side
of the tree-- a dense mat 
of flowerless hips--
this body knew thick 
thigh summer &
hands in pockets autumn 
& that season between
winter & spring--
this body grew around itself--
made a song from the silence
you left in me--
when you left, this body
found the stream--
took the rocks in hand &
climbed the spine of a mountain--
this body is delicate & fierce--
this body turned over
the stones--
this body lays out--
kisses all over your skin--
this body is moss--
my roots are soft
& my body is green

dear siri,

if i place my finger
over top of a city a thousand
miles away will you
tell me how to walk there?
we can flatten mountains with
our thumbs-- 
raise
gas stations from
the ground 
& eat apples
in parking lots.
we'll plant the seeds 
there.
tell me how to 
come back
siri-- 
take
me home the way we came
so i can see a parking
lot full of apple trees--
catch golden delicious
on the roof
of my green volvo
with the squeaky breaks &
a trunk full of 
places we only visit
on google maps when 
night makes the corners
of a room fall away--
becoming to creases of a map--
a mystic snake crawls on
its belly to bite
the cities of our dreams--
siri can you tell me
what the best way to 
walk across the ocean would be?
i'm not going to paris
but i might end up there--
i just want to cross the ocean--
the most direct route would
be best-- 
siri when was the last time
you watched the sun come up?
do you keep track of 
all the perhaps places
i've ask you to take me to--
is this intimate for you
like it is for me?
to know the blue lines
i ask you to draw in
the dirt-- 
do you laugh when i miss my turn
& keep driving 
because i feel particularly 
drawn to the texture of
a road beneath me?
oh siri let's be strip mall
lovers-- drink coffee
from back seats-- let's 
just draw lines on top
of lines & look at
what a journey would
look like--
take buses to the moon--
are you scared to give
me directions to the moon?
to the bottom of the ocean?
you know i'm not leaving 
so tell me how to get there--
you know i'm drowing
in this room-- 
in this stop light hymnal--
oh siri do you know
what i mean when i say
i want to go home now--
i want to go home--
when the ocean is done
being blue would you pick me up--
drive the car for me--
one hand on the steering wheel
like my father--
letting me lay down in
the backseat-- a little girl
again whose father waits 
for her to be done guitar
lessons or brushes her
hair when she's done swimming--
oh siri be my father for
me-- be my mother &
show me where the nearest honeysuckle 
bush is-- i'm thirty
& my ankles are covered
in snake bites from
all the places i pretended 
to travel with you--
oh siri oh siri-- 
i know where we live on
noble street it--
i know the flat of land
where we used to have a house
on main & the brick face of
our home on franklin 
is still slowly peeling away--
you tell me that home 
has an eta of twelve foot steps-- 
eight breaths-- &
an open window--
i open the window &
breathe in--

my gods are blue whales 

if i still have time
i think i would like
to learn to be a taxi driver
in the city-- i want to go
where you're going--
stop where you're stopping--
& let's meet on these street
corners together--
i won't ask what boy you're meeting
at the Museum of Natural 
History but i hope he 
likes dinosaurs & will
lay on the floor with you
to look up at the big blue
whale-- i make a up a story
where you're looking to
run away together--
walk into an exhibit &
turn into the manikins that 
wear Eskimo furs--
let's stop in central park &
invite some ducks inside 
the taxi too-- 
tell a hot dog vendor to
leave his stand & get
in-- we're all on our way
to the moon & don't ask questions
because it takes one
too many questions to prevent
a car from flying--
we'll watch our reflections
in the mirrored
walls of a skyscraper 
& someone will say that
they look like tooth picks
jutting out of the earth 
& we'll all get smaller &
the hot dog vendor will demand 
to be taken back to his cart
until of course when we enter
orbit & everything seems
to slow down--
you-- the girl in the back
seat of the taxi are a girl
like i have been with bleached
blonde hair pulled back with
sparkly hair clips--
with finger-less gloves & 
with a desire to linger
on street corners--
you are waiting for
a poem to come up 
from the ground-- to write
itself like a prophesy 
on the wall of the subway station
you are looking for a poem--
you are looking for a boy
to write a poem for you--
to point up at the belly
of the blue whale & make some
sense of the body of a creature
so massive that you 
could sleep in her veins--
let's be blue whales--
let's write holes into
our stockings--
let's take the ferry alone--
& when we come back down to
earth the ducks will
be flustered & 
the hot dog vendor will 
curse at me for lost business
& you-- the girl 
in the back seat
who is//was also a girl named
me-- you will meet a boy 
& he will empty you
of all your veins 
& you a girl will believe
you needed a city
to fill you-- 
alone in window
you will pick street lights
out of your fingers like
splinters--
oh girl i want you
to be a blue whale--
swallow skyscrapers &
reject your own reflection--
invite other girls to sleep
in your veins
while they try to find poems--
a city doesn't write a poem--
a city writes a stoplight 
& sticks tooth picks
in the ground in a muddled attempt
at being god--
my gods are blue whales--
not the living ones
but the ones who 
hang from ceilings--
when you get out of this taxi 
you will be a girl
again & you will of course
meet that boy because
we all meet that boy 
but when you're older 
take the ferry alone 
& come back-- come back 
& i'll still be here &
so will the ducks & so will
the mirrors of the skyscrapers
& i'll be the blue whale with
its mouth open--
lay yourself down
inside me when you're 
ready to write
this poem
on your body-- 
teach the people
to come from thousands of
miles to gaze up
at your enormous 
blue body--