The evacuation of my bones was almost an apology-- it wasn't a boy who taught me nothing that matters that has a mouth-- we kiss the clam shells of sesame bun lockets-- you taught me love was something we perform with our mouths and the bones blooming in African violet bruises in our throats-- love like an orchid is sick and only made of sleeping beauty-- only she never woke up-- just laid to be flipped over and over like a blushing pancake-- we like our girls golden dough-- chew macaroni and cheese like some sort of dying prayer to keep my bones from leaving again in shame-- -- read the box mix over my shoulder-- it's a boy's job to teach teeth what they belong in a mouth for-- my bones didn't run away from a boy-- they ran away so i could be everything you made me out to be-- this marconi effigy-- they ran away in an attempt to apologize for cutting my hair so short again-- they ran away because bones are too heavy and remember too much-- he punched me into a billow breath of silk scarf-- grab me in handfuls of ass through my skirt-- spaghetti hair to be twirled on a fork-- the good barefoot-- learn a mouth of Alfredo-- no it wasn't a boy who taught me about my mouth and gnawing on a moon from the altar of a windowsill sill-- the passing host in the sky always turns black eventually the the evacuation of my bones back into the soil God made me an acolyte so i wouldn't need a church to ring a bell-- i'm using it to call back the husks of a femur-- my knuckles scared of gripping-- my elbows smacked from the round table-- ribs shaven with the apple peeler-- i've got a burlap sack and i go out at night when the moon isn't watching from the inside of my mouth-- i go out when he's not cooking so i can lure them back under my skin-- you see we want deep down to be heavy-- not heavy like hair but heavy like pancakes-- like macaroni-- but not to share-- i eat from my own cereal bowl by a nightlight-- this food wasn't ever for you-- this skin wasn't here just to be soft-- it was here to make a canvas-- i painted with the apple peeler so much i forget what it was like to fill a mouth with a word-- a single word-- he took away every single word to replace with a bare foot and a box mix-- no wonder my bones needed to go home-- use themselves as seeds for something more worth while than me-- no i'll get them back-- i'm ringing the bell in a pot and a pan-- a soup spoon on a cereal bowl-- i only thought i would be an orchid until i realized i'm not lonely without you-- i've started eating words from cereal boxes-- verse written in macaroni elbows-- i took your Alfredo for a apology-- no these bones with come back with a shovel and new moon held higher than the host i have lived off of for so many nights-- don't eat a moon all at once or they'll know you were hungry-- measure yourself and the bones will come back again-- i will unlearn what boys taught me about a mouth-- we're using the bones for broth this time only they won't be my bones-- i'll make you into the cough of an African violet so you know what it's like to be my mother-- you should be scared-- it took me six years-- but i learned how to keep calling my bones back when they run away-- this is a half-apology for every time you filled my mouth with food into of words.
Robin Gow 