Spend some silence on me--
I can be bought with door knobs
and keys bent into promise rings.

have i told you about how i
am enamored of the possibility 
of you and me in a room?
lock the front door behind you--
has no one warned you yet about winter?
if you don't lock your doors
death can find us as unaware as 
scrambled eggs--
he spoons mashed potatoes 
from a cloud-- boils the gravy
in the mud--
winter is looking for a cold
place to hold himself--
he finds no more use
for blankets or layers of filo dough--
it is alright to feel bad for him--
he mistakes porches for
confessionals-- attempts to brew holy water
in milk and lavender from the gutters--
here inside a room
we are a possibility larger
than a spoon of winter or
the patience of a scrambled egg--
draw the floor plans for the
sky with me-- i have a blue crayon and
a diner place mat-- 
we'll order a black and white
milkshake from the windowsill--
our waitress is a cardinal because
red is too slippery a color
to be grasped by death or winter 
or a ploom of whipped cream--
maraschino cherries
we're meant for sharing--
they were meant for 
sacrifice-- 
we'll ask for two--
bleed bright in a crown of cream--
oh my queen you turn the door keys
into rings--
promise me you remember what a closed
door is like--
what it's like to fill a room 
with someone else--
bless me Winter for i have sinned--
i re-imagined the sky without
a cloud of a sun to take us
away from the blue--
the sea became a cloud because
of me-- became a 
spoon to float on--
promise me you bent the keys 
for us and not just me--
promise me you drew the 
sun back into the sky
so we can make the blankets
into filo dough-- crack cardinal
eggs in the pan--
do you remember 
how to be born
out a window in the snow?--
become a cardinal 
and thrash scars in the white--
heal maroon as a sugar maple in 
melting September-- 
we shouldn't risk a door knob
again-- 
that's how
everything rushes out of a room--
and we just got here--
spend a little more silences on
me-- i want to be spoiled--
remember this silence in a jar--
-- the kind of quiet
i don't eat with another spoon--
the kind of silence of a cardinal--
waiting to run again from
Winter-- he's lonely without
someone to share milkshakes with
but it was never your obligation to be
a lover--
i have a pocket full of door knobs
whenever you're ready to
write another sky 
from a room where you make 
silence with someone else-- 
promise you remember what the door
were like when they were locked
and what the keys felt like 
as promise rings--
i promised September i would
let the scars on my forearms 
grow into trees after it snowed--
i promise you to give you door
knobs-- and milkshakes--
bless me winter for i have sinned
to listen to the confessions 
of a season from the porch--
i can be a confessional--
a cardinal-- a cherry--
crawl out the windows with me so
we can keep the key we've turned
into rings-- 
i like the sky we made--
i'll put back the sun
if you help me fish the clouds
from the blue that once was a sea. 

They forced me to sing for the president
so i brought a three-string ukulele and
a pocket of thumb tacks

in first grade they charmed us like
cobras-- 
held a flag dangled as a dead rat
and told us to jump for the dreams
we shook loose from McDonald's wrappers--
this is our Big Mac-- the greasy bed
sheets of another morning 
where i smell his sweat on my blankets
even though i've been washing them
for six years-- 
i have been swaddled in processed cheese
squares-- melted-- devoured--
that's what they want us for--
a sexy wrapper strip tease of this girl 
in oil-- breaded and chicken fries--
when i was twelve i could
sing happy birthday on the
dissonant three sings
of my ukulele-- 
ask me to sing about a fist full
of hair in the hands of another man-- 
this hair is the reigns of
his horse and carriage sex fantasy--
yes mr. president yes
i still remember what my rapist 
smelled like
yes mr. president yes
i'll call you daddy because you
have no problem fucking the 
freedom out of another daughter--
use as the horse
to get to your throne-room--
i'm told to sing in the corner
of the office-- the oval
of another male gaze--
they didn't ask me to vote-- they 
didn't take my thumbprints in ink
this is blood--
i voted against you with my blood
with my throat bruised
in lavender roots--
the men shaved my head 
like a cobra-- 
laughed how they could
teach a whore to sing between the
strings of her ukulele--
demanded 
a song and they'll get one--
i'm going to sing your words
into our truth
the truth that you can 
grab me by the pussy but you 
can't keep us silent for 
four years--
America-- i see my rapist 
gilded as a God-- i see
the racial slurs on the bathroom
walls-- 
and i'll say i'm a faggot so you 
don't say it first--
yes mr. president
i'm building a wall-- 
i'm building great wall 
longer than the one in China--
my wall holds immigrants--
my wall holds Syria-- Muslims--
my wall speaks Spanish
La pared, la pared y 
voy a cruzar el río
con ustedes
son familia 
son familia sin sangre
en sangre
my wall is sung on three
ukulele strings-- my wall 
is built with this skin
without virginity--
this wall is for the fat 
bodies-- this wall is for
the black bodies--
this wall measures the inches
of ice caps melting
into squares of processed cheese
on the hamburgers of our monarch--
for the next four years
i'm keeping a pocket full of thumb
tacks and you can take that how 
you will--
these are for fists--
for flyers--
for patches in a wall we're going
to have to build and re-build--
for pinning ourselves 
to the torso of
trees-- for hanging the carcass
of the flag above our children's heads
and telling them there's something
still left there to sing--
so yes i'll sing for you
mr. president--
i'll sing for you
with a pocket full of thumb tacks
and a ukulele with three strings--
take that how you will--

My limbs dangling in the jungle gym, 
becoming the knot of an albino python,
and jaw breakers--

jump rope with two bodies-- 
i severed-off my legs in the sand box--
stuck in the ground like 
the trees crooked finger bones--
abandoned my arms still limp 
on the monkey bars-- 
my father used to hold me up by
my waist to help me cross
each rung--
and there i discovered what it
felt like to walk on water
from a jungle gym-- 
you can't blame me for wanting to 
become a serpent--
i was never
a person likely to make 
much use of my limbs anyway--
spent too many afternoons on my
stomach from the candy shop floor 
waiting for stray root beer barrels 
and strawberry jelly candies--
unhooked my jaw in anticipation
for the consumption of 
an entire world scrubbed clean 
in the glare and flicker of linoleum-- 
elect me in lavender-- in a
body fresh as a stove top coil--
i'm only hot as your morning--
warm me under the blaring
neon sun of the ice cream parlor--
don't mind me-- i'm just waiting for 
you to misplace a gummy worm--
sweet tooth sunk deep into
my own forgotten limbs--
this licorice rope is my body--
make penance out of a hand full of
jawbreakers--
what do you know about the snake who
eats their tail?--
or about the human who bites
their arms in an attempt to 
feel remorse for some sin
they might have once committed
with sweet fangs--
how many pounds of juju bees 
did you need to lose your teeth?
when you're tired take refuge in
a fist of taffy-- pythons are easily
mistaken for the flavor banana--
i shaved off my hair 
from the side of sand box where i 
hid my legs--
there was the ancient ruins
of a sand castle but
only you and i would have known it was there--
skip rope with the long-hair
girls when they sing
apples, peaches, pears, and plums 
tell me when your birthday comes--
so i answer with an unhinged kiss
and a mouth three jaw breakers deep--
they never teach you what to do
once your mouth is full--
apples peaches pears and plums--
i'm as old as the knee caps 
tied into a spine of a tree-- 
older than a spool of taffy 
or sugar geode--
i became
a python to be able to eat jawbreakers--
gulp the long hair girls 
and their baskets of apples,
peaches,
pears,
and plums-- the apology of a bruise--
the impatient hum of an empty candy shop--
arms still dangling from 
the monkey bars--

The fine china tea cups still wrapped in newspaper,
my father's hunger vigil, and how i learned to keep
the universe from getting lonely at night.

my family never intended to use 
the good china plates-- we ask about them at Christmas
out of appreciation-- reverence even--
our table has turned into a carpet--
into a palm to hold mashed potatoes--
a forearm full of asparagus consecrated 
with a fist of Parmesan--
my father still stands vigil at
the counter to eat butterfly-wings of
ham-- honey beats us into a moon--
he watches the door like death is
still looking for him in the body
of a stray cat with patches all over
her thighs-- he drinks diet coke
there like penance-- stares at the
ham out of fear and hunger and hatred--
he doesn't want the cat to see him
eating with a fork and knife--
we keep the fine silverware in a
used box of gourmet chocolates and
spend half the year opening it the hopes
that it's been hiding one last 
peanut butter swirled truffle for us to
orbit-- 
it might be only me who glances at the
boxes of tea cups while we finish 
Christmas dinner 
i feel like i understand them somehow--
and my father still dares not chew the
hem from course skirt on the apple pie--
my mother tells him to eat but he only
glares at another cat pawing at the window--
my brothers don't think about utensils--
use two fingers like chopsticks-- navigate
a plate as cautious as the handle of a tea cup--
my father
stabs a fork in the meat-- our conquistador--
each tea cup on the shelf from the china set
is still headline-swaddled-- gold eye brows
raised at a sink full of left-sock 
dishes-- 
the tea cups judge us for washing
pizza crusts in the dish washer--
we're out of soap so we add another punch 
of shredded cheese-- our knuckles
broken into boulders of salt--
we diagnose ourselves with the polka-dots pox of
the slumped couch who is almost as tired
as my mother-- 
we are elbow people-- aluminum 
foil crowned-- gilded of a microwave
lightning bolt hurled from the bangles 
of a god who is weary of my father--
my father only sleeps on his elbows
and my mother remarks that the ham is 
getting cold and the ice cream on
the pie has turned to milk 
again-- 
for a moment he want to be a china tea cup
too-- we all do-- clean and secret like
the monotonous history of a newspaper--
i wait for them to sleep--
each melting into the
cracks of the sofa-- engulfing 
my family like a palm of mash potatoes--
our beds chew us with gums
and my father falls face-first into 
the lap of the apple pie--
we check to make sure
he's only sleeping before we go outside
to scare the stray cats off the porch--
we know they're not coming for my
father-- not yet-- but he doesn't know
that so he thinks he still has to keep 
watch-- and the dishes
fidget and try to wash themselves in the sink--
like the tea cups i'm the one who doesn't sleep here--
i shush a tea kettle and sit on the counter
beside where my father sleeps from his elbows--
someone has to keep the universe company 
when everyone else has forgotten about
the fine china-- 
it's just our little secret--
i open the window and the room turns
into a plate of stars stolen from
the boulders of salt we 
rolled like dice into mashed potatoes--
the universe sits there with me
and together we unravel the tea cups--
squint to watch them under
the glare of the moon gazing in at us like
a stray cat from the window--
have you ever seen the moon get down
on her knees? she does so only for a beautiful
tea cup or a spoon of sugar chai--
i tell the universe about our
family while i pet my father's
hair-- i tell her that we don't remember
where the dinner table went--
i tell her about the china we're drinking
from and the clamor of dishes in the
sink-- i tell her about my brothers
and their small chop stick fingers--
i laugh about the stains on my dress
and yawning of the sofa--
she thinks it's marvelous and cries
because she's lonely without
a table to approximate from a carpet--
she spends must nights alone
on a gold haloed plate quietly munching
a forest of asparagus--
she keeps herself clean for astronomers--
i pet her hair too and tell her that's what
our counter top is for-- 
so she comes back each Christmas--
helps me wash the two tea cups and put
them back-- brushes the night sky
out of the living room-- our little secret--
i wake up early to tell my father
to wipe the pie off his nose and eat--
only then is he too tired to refuse-- 

in remembrance of 
the disposable love poetry of white boys--
when was the last time you eloped with yourself?

boys love so much like a snicker doodle--
laugh your hair covered in cinnamon and sugar--
dissolve in the glass of milk-- take
a thumb full of butter over your lips
and promise you that this time they
learned LOVE in the curve of your wrists--
the way you hold spoons like balance beams 
and the nightlights you ignite by
turning a loop of Orion's belt into
a tea light-- put the batteries back
into my neck-- i'm a moon shadow-- 
melt me in the glass of milk and somehow
boys always turn into chocolate-- 
find a way to melt into freckles--

i left myself a love poem this morning
in remembrance of all the times boys
have mistaken me for sugar or for the 
twisted stem of a plum--
i wrote it on a pink sticky note-- creased
on the forehead of my old blue locker-- 

in the eighth grade when i was convinced 
i was neither the cookie nor the glass of
milk i poured love letters to myself
in measuring cups of grapes and 
cheerios-- loved this body 
a whole 1/4 cup full-- 
dream and bake me a brownie pan--
i was meant for squares-- i was a corner piece--
i was the puckered lips of a cinnamon raisin bagel--

i'm trying to learn how to run away 
without boy poems-- because boy poems 
bleed milk like the fountain 
they made of Saint Catherine's neck
how dare she write love poems with someone else's tongue--
a oven full of books-- she spun as bobbin--

i ran away to the ledge of a window to
use the glass as a mirror and count
the stars leaving chocolate in my freckles-- wrote
the constellations into poetry--
i undress here and i know you could
watch if you wanted to but this isn't
a naked picture for you to frame 
in a glass of milk-- this isn't disposable
like the love poems you birthed in sugar
and cinnamon-- this isn't a spoon
this is my balance beam-- this is a love
poem written to the girl-body 
who collects nightlights 
out of fear of the dark and being 
drown in another glass of milk before bed--

i love you and iris raisins-- locker combination
to my mouth-- full me with loose paper--
fragments 'i love you written' in the margins 
of a blue spiral bound notebook--
swallow yourself quicker than a staircase
but as patient as the 1/4 measuring cup
dumped into the bowl--
it's morning now and time to empty the
back porch of love poems
written on rye bread with margarine-- disposable
sentences of stale popcorn another boy
pulled from the puckered bagel mouth

of a dead poet-- stop writing me words
i've already said and start leaving love
on my locker door-- twist my neck until
it opens into milk--

i'm not naked by a window mirror 
to prove something to a love poem boy
who tastes like a rice crispy treat-- quick 
and measured in squares-- 

i'm not naked by a window mirror
to remind you of something you could
of had or could have wanted if you had the 
patience to pour me into a bowl instead
of dunk my lungs deep in milk

i'm not naked to become another wilted
love poem you decide to melt in chocolate--

i'm naked to the window to prove
there's still places to elope with myself--
still corners of this body left for me
to leave sticky notes-- i love the
creature who is bold enough attempt
to fit the stars in a 1/4 of a cup-- 
build nightlights--
marry the milk glass--
laugh still balanced on a spoon-- 

hitch hike with me through a blinding snow
to the front door of our house in fleetwood

in 1996 i was born in the snow storm--

i guess not actually in the snow storm--

i was born in july 

there was still
snow on the ground in july

only it was the soil's
remembered feeling of snow--

the dirt dreamed of 
sensation-- cold hipbones--
laying in bed with the onion grass
bulbs and frost each night
as the sky only broke more
bags of dove pieces--

the earth remembered 
what it was like to pull snow cones
from her throat to snore--

she remembered 
in april when we were
supposed to be throwing up
daffodils in the celebration 
of a LITTLE GIRL to keep
pink balloons from bursting
into dove pieces
--HER cupcake fists and
grip of an icicle--

we stuck out our thumbs
in scratchy red mittens--

i was born in the house
next to the railroad tracks
across the street from a 
factory who felt every shout of 
wind from the blizzard-- 
held the snow in her stomach
to pretend she was expecting a child--
only to feel herself melting
in july--
caught pink balloon in her windows--

we were picked up by a rust
fringed blue jeep--
sat on each other laps
when we said we were headed to 
fleetwood
we were picked up by 
our father
only he didn't know
he was our father

i caught the snow in the 
color of my knuckles-- the frost
still crunches in the aluminum
crinkling of jaw
when i try to kiss people--
i popped the pink balloons
so that they could fall
in more pieces of doves--
you say CONGRATULATIONS
IT'S A GIRL
but you were wrong
i was a blinding snow-- 
crawled out of the factory
to hitch hike
with my father and you
to my front door step
bleeding with dove limbs--

my father offered us
candy spear mint leaves from the glove 
box-- we had to refuse
seeing as we had yet to be born

and who were you?
i have two brothers and you
were neither of them
and both of them--
you were the pink balloons
bursting into doves--
the body the sun paints
in bed to lie with us
all summer when the windows
are open and 
the factory building has burned down
but her soil still feels alone--

and when we get to the door step
knock with your cupcake fists--
coil into a basket
so they can float you high
as pink balloons-- 

the train has my voice
through the aluminum foil
railroad tracks at night--
clatter of a screen door 

the empty passenger seat of a blue
jeep-- our father eating the last
pieces of spearmint leaf candy 
and wanting to share it
with the passengers 
no longer sitting there beside him

i was born in a blinding snow--
sleep with the hot body of July--
pop pink balloons
with my scratchy red mittens-- 

princess trials, canned peas under the mattress
and the irrevocable fate of the potted plants in the window

i know you're the one who was never satisfied with the result--
convinced that my sleepless nights are a self-inflicted
performance art piece-- the sleeping beauty statue who 
spends each hour long and hard rummaging for a thought
beneath their eyelids-- 
this is where we found our
names scarred above the tailbone of the elm tree-- this
is where i removed the dead leaves from your hair--
whispered to you that if you love me you have to accept
two things: 
1-- i'm incapable of sustaining life from a ceramic pot
on a windowsill-- 
2-- i'm on trial as a princess-- No-- not a princess who
eats strawberry shortcakes and crosses her legs beneath
another sea of ruffles-- another lake lapping with eyelids--
no i'm the princess who kisses like the rim of a tea cup--
i'm the princess who sleep like another steady suicide
of the moon-- another ray of light beneath a door frame--
my eyelids have clasps like a change purse
1-- some people buy children to fall in love again-- we bought
a potted violet-- a stout cactus and a woven tree to stand
in sequence on my windowsill--
2-- one pea wasn't enough for you to test me-- you wanted
to see how clattering this girl-body could sleep-- you took
the rations from the bomb shelter-- the cans you shook
like wet maracas and said:
     now we can know for sure-- for sure your the princess 
     your name promised me last night when you were saying
     a elegy for the moon
1--i warned you i kill potted plants out of mercy-- who
want to live with their legs coiled under bed sheets--
trying to grow into a can of peas--
2-- my body reject my skin sometimes and i watch myself sleeping
next to you-- and you don't feel the cans of peas under the
mattress-- 
2-- did i tell you how hard it is to climb back into a body?
2-- i open the cans while you sleep still as a 
the rock body of the moon-- dip silver spoon and cold peas
at four in the morning when the sun considered feeding the windowsill
1-- i threw their bodies in the yard while you were away-- i warned
you that the death of a potted plant at my hands is irrevocable--
2-- princesses are good a burials
1-- weave goodnight in dead branches
2-- test me test me my sleep warden-- i'm ready to prove 
i can feel anything beneath a mattress
2-- why don't we try it the other way around this time? make
a body of peas and i'll sleep under the beds and you
tell me if you can feel me-- feel me leave my body again
2-- this is a performance art piece-- this is what we made of
the bomb shelter-- 
2- if i don't wake up when you call me peel back the mattresses 
like the lids of a can and spoon me out in cold beads 
on the blankets-- an interrogation for the passive death
of the stout cactus you thought we could grow into a crown
of thorn--

appetizer eyes of Saint Lucy
and other times i looked up 
like a cluster of grapes--

we learned well how to look up
from a golden plate-- this is
where we see from the serving dish--
you tell me it's New Years--
and leave the rest of my body for
a furnace--

1.
roll your dollar bills into tumble
weeds across a table cloth--
stack me taller sundae spoons
-- my eyes have been free
for the taking-- i'm the Eiffel tower
made of pennies and quarters--
they teach boys to scowl
like the men posing on money

2.
the supermarket has samples on
sundaes and we all get free salsa
only onions sting as eyes drops
and i don't eat fried fish
even though God decided that
fish don't count

3. 
it's friday and the night walks
with heavy steps on the lip of
another plate of hor d'oeuvres

4.
remember me like a mini quiche--
coiled and naked for you
as a shrimp cocktail laid in ketchup--
pretend it's ketchup and 
not blood turned thick with 
heavy steps around the filo dough

5.
learn how to see with a tooth pick
through your iris-- the general tso's
chicken salesmen-- hand behind his back
teaching girls for the first
time to say 'no' but only
because we bodies don't eat meat
anymore-- and yes fish count 
because they have blank appetizer 
eyes like ours-- lay in the ice
to cool off from the furnace--
we can blink away the ash without
eyelids--

6.
i've been free for the taking
just to look down your throat like
an artificial grape--
soft and delectably dead

7.
feed me Greek goddess-- the steady
throat of another king who 
married us into a furnace--
twirl your eyes like spaghetti 
on forks--

8.
Saint Lucy saw the world from a golden
plate where we all want to sit--
so what if our eyes are reverted to
jalapeno poppers or 
mozzarella sticks-- bleed 
me marinara 

9.
who told you we could wear
a crown of fire

10.
it's New Years and i'd rather you hold
the golden plate-- if i have to serve
my eyes from here

11.
i saw the moon from the eyes
of a door knob to the brothel--
virginity is best compared to 
eye balls on a golden plate--
who wouldn't mistaken them for grapes?

12.
an apostle of small gatherings
and midnights--
me and Saint Lucy and all the girls
they teach how to balance fire on our
heads-- we all learned to lay 
naked as cocktail shrimp--
these pink pink pink
unborn body flame-- coil
and wait for someone to take notice 
of you from the plate--

1. 
what do you pay for in tumble weeds?
the expectation of the tooth pick
and denial of being by general tso
and his tooth pick teeth--
blindness pirouetted from a plate
of pasta-- oh there's so many different
colors you make us bleed--
the night walks heavy on the ledge
of a gold plate--

1. 
this is where we see from the serving dish

1.
martyr the waitress 

1.
pay me in a ride through a furnace--
we all know you came here to 
look down on me-- naked
and pale as filo dough--
this plump grape gaze
was waiting for a fat hand--
fish don't count in the mortality rate
-- and neither
do our eyes--
avert your stare-- 
i'm undressing

there is a kind of love i've
only known in banana bread
and the condensation in metal
pot lids over tamale pie---

my mother rises love different
than my father--
my father is a hand full of jelly 
beans tossed in a Ziplock bag--
a potato roll with peanut butter
and goldfish crackers-- a bar stool--  
a pound of gummy red lobsters
for breakfast already turning
into ulcers--
my hair tangled in funnel cake--
his lap was for watching fireworks--
my mother is patient enough to
make bread-- 
she rises love on the counter--
the loaf of rye-- these
soft stones of dinner rolls pulled
from the river that runs through her kitchen--
we baked a forest of 
creatures is pretzels-- these
knots in my hair were only part
of the dough 
and she was the one who combed
my hair with a fork 
and a knife and
the metal pot lid over my forehead--
the packet of yeast on the
fridge door was like a crucifix 
above an entrance-- 
when i was sixteen and looking
for something to bite at other
than my own skeleton--
i used to reflect on all the times
my mother never said
the words "i love you"--
my mother is a kind of love
that is always rising on the counter--
a hot bubble on the lid of crock
pot-- the plate set with tamale pie
even when she knew there
was no part of me that wanted
to do with eating--
my mother broke into measuring
cups for me-- braided fish
tails and left the chocolate 
chips out of zucchini bread every
one in awhile just for me--
she has been the architect behind
birthday cake domes and
cookie pies shaped like Pokemon-- 
the flip of a pancake
and my knees pulled apart
like monkey bread-- my mother
painted my nails on a school
night after coming home-- 
arms still printed with 
newspaper headlines--
but she said she would
and she always does--
my mother puts the bread in the oven
and she's not good at cookies
like i am-- she takes
longer on a stone slab--
i caught quick love like my father--
the impatience of raspberry thumb prints
and shot guns full of spritz cookies--
my mother could make my hair into 
a quilt-- a shawl-- 
a chocolate chip scone to
built us a pyramid-- a temple--
a church and a Pokemon gym--
broke herself into 
1/2 cup and 1/2 cup for
her child who took their bones
to mortar and pestle-- to make 
flour-- she keeps a house warm
in a crock pot-- a sink 
of a loved dishes and the coffee
grinds on the counter--
we are either side of an everything
bagel stuffed with vegetable cream cheese--
she waits for me under pot lids--
and we wear umbrellas beneath
the rain from mist--
my mother is an African violet
by the sink watching
another loaf of sourdough
resurrecting on the counter--
i always come back to her
kitchen-- and the pretzels creatures
hide from me under the oven--
a prodigal child-- 
i apologize in sponges
and cookie tins--
she laughs quiet like a crock pot--
a metal lid over our heads--
and tamale pie smeared
on our bare porch feet--
the door knob still tastes like
her banana bread
or a slice of zucchini bread without
chocolate chips-- 

Lust is a form of belief--
Build me a city on the moon
to escape to and eat through
the apple core of the poem-- 

they lied when they said
if you don't love yourself
then you can't love anyone else
because if that were
true then i would have spent
the last twenty years of my
life living only on apple oatmeal 
a sexless type of lust--
and vanilla pudding 
cups congregating in the corner
of a dorm room-- their foil
lids i take as silver medals
or approximations for a
one-way ticket to the moon--  
i'm the creature
with the smallest spoon and the 
only form of self-love
i've ever practiced effectively 
is a gulp of instant oatmeal
past midnight-- i open
peanut butter jars just
to smell with glimpse
and lamp light-- take the 
wrist flick of a butter knife--
lust is a potato roll full
of cream cheese or banana medallions
at milk bottom of a bowl of Cheerios--
yes i eat the stems of apples--
through the core the same way i devour
across a poem-- 
wriggle rhyme between my 
crooked cobblestone skyline teeth--
Eve picked
this fruit for a reason 
so i ask you if you're ready
to build a city for me
on the moon-- 
love a body made of apple seeds--
i eat with tiny spoons so i can
save the measuring cups for 
blueberry muffins-- 
our head were lustful of streusel 
i'll let you in on a secret--
the moon is only really a cheesecake 
that i baked when everyone
forgot to check the oven timer--
one slice at a time--
this is empty plate--
i saved the tiny spoon for myself--
i taste so much like unsweetened 
oatmeal i forget that i'm worthy
of a city baked on the moon--
you buy me vanilla pudding cups--
hold me like a ladle--
we can forge the buildings from cranberry
soda cans and glass bottles of
diet root beer that remind my of
my father-- his brown 
bottle fingers he uses to 
drive a card board box of juju bees--
have i only ever baked out of lust
for a version of you 
who wears black canvas shoes--
no i know you like
the bare plate of the moon and
i have never loved something
for the lust of a cupcake skirt--
i'm a queer-blooded oatmeal 
bowl looking for a spoon
looking for a sliced banana medallion--
looking for the sound of my father's
hands--
no 
they lied to me when they told
me i needed to love myself 
because-- i have lived these last
years only on love spooned 
into the skirts of muffins--
into the pie-crust of a moon--
are you building a city yet?
i don't believe in Lust anymore
and if i do it might taste 
something like cheesecake of
peanut butter lids--
i don't have the illusion 
anymore that love was meant to
make me bold enough to hold
a fork in between my teeth
but i do live on the belief
that there's enough left
for a city on the moon--
we weren't meant orbit--
we were meant for graham crackers--
for root beer mouths--
for the apple seeds growing
an orchard out of my chest--
don't let them tell you there
is a condition for loving
you-- and if they tell you
it's Lust eat in front of the
mirror--
laugh in apple cores--
lay bricks of cream cheese--
split potato rolls like
His body
and the moon--