The bees knew I was more than an apple.

And you thought I was just an apple--
The temptrex seduction for which
we will all dance the Charleston in hell. 
Yes but wasn't it worth it
Adam had nothing on me and he only
kissed Eve because he hadn't known 
an apple yet-- 
Oh! Eve's fruit! Oh Rome! Oh Macintosh!
Oh Adam who would never eat
enough apples to learn how to love Eve--
Adam man and Eve girl get on your knees
beneath the branches-- look
for me like a wedding ring on
a coral reef-- I'm rarer than apples
and redder than Winesap-- my love
Brew me cider and thick stem-- 
Look for me like the backs of
your sister's ruby earrings-- like paper clips
like pumpkin seeds lodged again in
the gut of their mothers
like penance and Pentecost 
like sleeping under the apple tree
in sin-- like being chased out
of the garden of Eden 
by drunken bees 
and 
you look under the tree limbs--
the shade of the leaves 
where the largest fruit
resist wasp queens-- Oh! What it feels
like to rule a kingdom where
your people have to kneel to see your
sunburn face-- blush bruised from 
the frost and gospel hymns they
sing from the bottom of the reef--
I was there
too with you on the ground in that rot.
We waited 
in the mouth of a yellow jacket--
All those bees who keep singing 
about how many more 
weeks of frost they could live angry 
and drunken off of fermenting apple
froth-- up to your feet sink 
into
the soil and become a sapling--
I'll teach you about sin and apples
and we can share Adam and Eve. 
Tell them to dance the Charleston for
us when we're bored and the crooning of the bees 
is so loud we can't hear the other sisters 
falling
falling
falling
It's our job to help the bees die softly 
before they frost over
in November-- did you count
how many were left?
How many could still sing and how
many were looking for their wedding
rings on the reef-- did they drown in
the cider or in our blood--
were they looking for rubies or 
the backs of earrings?
Oh they knew me like Adam and Eve could not.
They didn't dance but
they sang and they crowned themselves
in pumpkin seeds and Pentecost--
Oh! The Garden is burning and you
thought I was only an apple here--
thought I was a mouthful of desire
and decay-- Oh kneel Adam Oh cry Eve--
Where do we bury the bodies of the bees. 

My father and I as nowhere men
between gun shots and gummy worms.

My dad says that the days
are bad now because when he wakes up it's dark 
and when he gets home it's dark. 
I ask him what I can do
for him and he says 
SHOOT ME
and he laughs like he always does.
SHOOT ME
I don't tell my father much anymore.
I don't tell him that I feel that way 
too like
SHOOT ME
I don't tell him that when I'm sad
I think about eating gummy worms with him
under a willow tree at the farmer's
market. I remember how we play with the radio
until it sang to us from the GREEN APPLE
Beatles CD
and I don't tell him that when I feel
like I want to run away I imagine 
that corn field in July after
karate practice when he stopped our
jeep just so I could fill my pockets
with lightning bugs.
I don't tell him I think there's less
lightning bugs now.
I want to tell him--
me too
me too
me too
me too-- I feel like ice cube trays.
Me too I spin myself in the afternoons
to the turn of a
Beatles record with John Lennon 
singing 
Nowhere man 
nowhere man 
nowhere man 
I used to think my father wrote that song
but now I knew we're both
just NOWHERE MEN
I think we understand each other
through some sort of thing called 
melancholy-- it's the language
we talk over telephones-- 
in between the notches of a record--
and from the front seats 
of the van.
I see us in the same
morning saunter between
a kitchen counter and a digital 
clock. My father doesn't eat breakfast
and I eat grapes from a measuring cup
at the kitchen table-- perched like
a bottle cap on from porch--
My father doesn't watch the news but
we can compromise on watching 
Arthur on PBS from opposite sides
of a slumped sofa. I learn to drink
coffee and when he opens his
diet coke it sounds like the cracked 
knuckles of an ice cube tray.
And the radio in his jeep 
sings 
Nowhere Man, please listen
You don't know what you're missing
Nowhere Man, the world is at 
your command
We talk melancholy there until he
asks me if I would be ready when 
the sun came up--
and the digital clock reads 5:55am
and we walk out into the back yard 
for the last time as NOWHERE MEN.
The same back yard where I practiced 
karate with my father who was
always a sensei--
The grass makes our feet
wet with dew-- we don't
wear shoes and the sky is orange
and yellow
and burnt like lightning bug tails.
he pulls out a gun and so do I
point at each other
we both close our eyes
when we pull the triggers 
and it sounds like the opening 
of a can of diet coke and 
the digital clock is screeching
6:00am 6:00am 6:00am
we're both late to nowhere--
and we wake up on opposite
sides of the slumped sofa
after the gun shots--
look at each other for an instant
and go back to drinking coffee
and diet coke.
I perch like a bottle cap and he 
hangs his head like a willow tree.
SHOOT ME
he says and he laughs like ice cubes.
SHOOT ME
I say and I pass him a gummy worm
while he hums 
Nowhere man, nowhere man, nowhere man.

The apple tree and my body that grew inward.

You shouldn't eat so many apple seeds
They say 
because I eat through the core--
through the sinews-- through the marrows 
of an apple each morning before the
sun dries itself out in the sky-- broiled
tart-- baked in cinnamon and butter--
bubbles and spits sugar down on us
standing earthly bound and eating through
the cores of apples
while the snakes warm their bellies--
You will grow an apple tree inside you
They say 
because they've seen it all happen before--
Seen girls cough pollen for weeks
and weeks and weeks-- 
kneeling and trying to make themselves
small as thimbles or oven mitts
feel the fruits grow underneath their lungs--
breathe low and cautious like a mother
spit out apples the size of Jupiter's moons
in their hands each morning only to eat them
again while the snakes watch from the corner--
grow more seeds
grow more apples 
prune back the leaves 
with your ribs until you bleed
cider and butter and cinnamon blood 
broiled blackened on the sidewalk.
I asked if the tree grew from my
womb or my stomach and they said that
there were seeds in both and the apples
were red and mustard and greed and rug-burn
kneed and lipstick flowers on wrists
and your grandmother's worn golden earrings
You will learn to grow inward
They say
because that's how they teach us to survive--
close our eyes and pull the strings of
our spinal chords to turn on the lights
we've been saving underneath our clavicles--
GROW INWARDS 
Seal your lips up with needle and thread
and keep the apples for 
yourself-- leave the extras in the sky
to find themselves as more moons for Jupiter
to fashion a belt out of--
prune the tree each morning
and build book shelves
from the extra limbs-- write poetry 
about thimbles and oven mitts
and carve the skin off your womb 
to make a baking oven-- one not for
thimbles-- compose your own sun 
as an apple tart and shower in cinnamon 
and butter when it rises from the oven
each morning.
You're selfish to keep an apple tree from
     all those boys 
They say  
Because they know what apples do to 
girl bodies-- we invite the snakes to
watch us-- learn to speak only
in poetry--our apple-seed code-- talk
to the snakes and leave lipstick
stains on their scales as they slither
away with slices of our apple tarts
They say we were good bakers 
but that we should have saved more
time for thimbles and oven mitts
and less time for book shelves
You'll have to cut down the apple tree if
     you want to be a person
They say
Because it's so much nicer to use
your womb to bake cakes and your
lungs to hold up Jupiter moons
than it is to breath and give 
birth to more apples each morning--
And you know your can never stay a tree
for long-- never eat enough seeds
turn your skin into bark--
But today be an apple tree with me
let it curl out of your mouth and speak
poetry to the snakes--

Eat through the core.
Grow inward. 

Out damn COFFEE MUG girl! 
Do you remember when he made YOU a headline?

Little girls in their
plastic princess shoes talk about growing
up to have someone make them famous.
Comb each hair of their Barbie into
lines and practice walking on tip-toes--
sucked in stomach in the mirror--
taping headlines on their walls
in frames of glitter glue.
The thane of Fife had a wife: where is she now?
Oh! KINGS WILL BE KINGS AND
BOYS WILL BE BOYS WILL BE BOYS
WILL BE HEADLINE MAKERS WILL
BE rape STATISTIC thanes who
will BE BOYS BE BOYS BE BOYS.
Be a girl when they say
on sleepover blankets:
I want him to be a politician--
to call me LIBERTY-- call me court 
cut me out of my pencil skirt on 
a desk and tell me I can pick
up papers for the rest of my
life-- heel-clamor at slammed doors 
and remember him calling me LIBERTY 
call me COFFEE MUG to fill
me with princess shoes.
Write the chorus the thanes all sing 
YOU WANT IT YOU WANT IT YOU WANT IT
YOU WANT TO BE MY COFFEE MUG--
wipe the stains from the headlines
and bend like a good SLUT
like a coffee handle remind us
all the he was a good man
a GOOD boy a GOOD thane a GOOD king
What, will these hands ne'er be clean?
Be a girl when they say
as they out grow plastic shoes:
I want him to throw footballs--
throw me like a vase out a window
to land on a sidewalk and have them
pick up the pieces of my sweat
shirt to ask me why I wanted to
let him break me so many different ways--
You know as well as I  that we were all
just waiting to be famous--
Be a girl when we ask each other
how much we want to be raped?
Some of us get lucky and get to choose
whose blood stains our headlines--
Out, damned spot! out, I say!--One: two: why,
then, 'tis time to do't.--Hell is murky!--Fie, my
lord, fie! a soldier, and afeard? 
Oh! Don't say it-- don't call it RAPE
and how many headlines they'll
use to clothe us in yellow tape-- because
if your famous someone must be FUCKING you--
You slut-- you whore-- you curse of girl-body
who thought they could ever be a LADY
You're a microphone-- a spatula-- 
a stove-- a pen cap-- a coffee mug
-- a necktie lynched around a waist 
like a princess leash-- 
YET HERE'S A SPOT--and the headlines
will say: What is it she does now? 
Look how she rubs her hands.
So say I in my headline 
Come, you spirits-- you flash-blubs 
you cameras-- you naked in newsprint--
that tend on mortal thoughts
UNSEX ME HERE
-- and I won't wash my
hands of any king's blood--
and they'll call me a CRAZY and a HYSTERICAL
SLUT-- 
and brand PATRICIDE on my forehead
but at least he won't have made me famous--
Oh! The girls laugh when I tell them
I won't be a rape headline-- 
they say: It is an accustom'd action 
with her, to seem thus
washing her hands. 
I have known her continue 
in this a quarter of
an hour.
but it's only because I already have
been-- we all already have been-- 
there's too many spots of blood to
wash but look what you've done--
there's nothing left to take
COME THICK NIGHT
so the my keen knife see the wound it 
makes-- write RAPIST over
BOY WILL BE BOYS WILL BE BOYS--
will be rapists. 
Yet who would have thought the old man to
have had so much blood in him?

Bathrooms without shower curtains and other
ways to hold a funeral for a house.

It was a Tuesday because it's always a Tuesday.
He washed his face in the mirror and then
the man turned out the lights in the upstairs 
bathroom where he had always
left one light flickering like a earthbound 
star-- belt buckle of Orion to hold up
our fathers-- the red light above the
tabernacle. 
son and wives had watched for the glow
behind the veil of curtains  
and thought about
lighthouses and Christmas--
and their father who always left too
many lights one.
Front door closed like a jar of raspberry jam-- 
tighter & tighter.
The man walked away from the porch
between the two elm trees in the front yard--
one still holding the burden of a child's swing.
The house blinked
He was consumed-- swallowed-- submerged 
into the licorice veins of damp streets.
Sewn into the contorted sauntering of cars 
crawling on their hands and knees
through a foggy morning--
those basilisks or demons.
The house felt herself hollow-- caressed 
the space in her torso where they
had once laid the tweed couch
-- touched lightly
the scars from 
the children's watercolor paintings 
that had once hung at the 
end of each of her hallways-- she felt
larger & larger but still
tighter & tighter from the absence of 
foot steps & foot stools
under the staircase in the basement.
She waited-- vigil on into night and
the bathroom remained
dark and shower sat stripped naked without
a curtain. No one washed themselves
to let her cry there-- 
only then did she know she was dying.
There was a window left open downstairs.
In came the mourners already-- glinty beetles who
casually invited the moths and the chipmunks
and the raccoon who dropped
raspberries on the hardwood floor like
blood or broken down stars--
the last thing she could remember was
the sound of lightning bugs
turning their lamps on & off
on & off and she had wondered if
the man would peel her open by the front
door ever again-- fill her with warm
footed children and sofas and scars--
He could nail portraits to her vertebrae and frame
posters of rock bands across her forearms.
The next morning was Tuesday--
because it's always Tuesday.
She didn't wake up-- lay there
mouth open in her windows-- 
The raccoons wondered if it had been their
fault that she had died like that.
The two elm trees outside were startled by
the rotting wood beams on the porch--
looked at their own trunks and wondered
if trees lived longer than houses &
longer than people-- they had forgotten
to keep track of their age through all these
years and they nuzzled their roots closer
to her corpse for comfort-- held her body in
their limbs and sang to her
about humans & about fog & 
about how the lightning bugs had 
learned to severe off pieces of stars
to turn on & off their lamps every night.
The elm trees forgot about time again
and forgot to be worried about not waking
up-- scheduled a funeral for her and laid
vines that raptured into white flowers 
in April-- the bees made nests in her scares
and the wild raspberry bush outside
crept into the living room where
she used to feel the whole family come
together on the mustard tweed sofa--
filled her belly with glinty beetles
and they all wrote songs about the light
in the bathroom and the feet of children
even though they had never felt
them like she had. Her stomach bled with
berries and in that was the summer
she lost what was left of her eyes-- 
the shards of glass collapsing inward until
she was nothing but open eyes-- air paraded into
her hallways enough to rouse the ghosts of
each water color paintings 
and blow up the skirt of the shower curtain--
she shivered there.
Lit the light in the bathroom.
Washed her face in the mirror.

Noah's arch and the animal crackers.

None of us were ready to pair off
two by two-- we held on to the hem of
each others skirts and tried to pretend
to be aardvarks and seals-- we crawled on our
bellies and barked at a new moon peeking over
the edge of the prickled-backed corn fields. 
I had always liked warm rain. 
This rain was the kind that
steamed off the tilled soil
like a lid lifted from a pot
of macaroni and cheese
for days 
before it resolved to fall.
This rain hung in our sugar bones and in our
ridged fake cheetah tails-- We put on masks
to be crows-- flapped our arms and tried to
jump high enough to convince them we were
capable of flight. Squawked on our knees--
Begged to be to let  
on board his arch that was only
a white bowl resting on the edge
of the counter top next
to the boxes of fruit loops and raisin bran. 
Some of the other creatures broke their
legs and fed their pieces to the camels 
and the lions-- smothered frosting on their
backs and tangled sprinkles in their matted
fur to be something desirable for the journey--
nibbled at their own femurs--
shared knee-caps and their mother's bed time stories--
dipped elbows into milk.
We laughed at all
the goldfish crunched under sneakers
on the kitchen floor.
We swept up their 
cheddar scales and salt bones. 
It had been comforting to think how there
would be more room for us in the bowl--
we counted the people who turned 
out to be goldfish and the people who 
turned into crumbs before
the rain came.
Some of them wanted their parents to be
the ones to eat them if there wasn't
going to be enough room-- 
broke off each limb one by one until 
they were nothing but cat-tails and 
crow masks and elbows and frosted-fur
We walked two by two and pretended and
to be doves-- everyone needs doves
in a cereal bowl or an arch or
a rain storm--
poured in tomato soup and milk and
steam from pots of macaroni and
cheese-- camels fractured by the 
prickled-spine, lions clamored-- mouths 
full of frosting and cheetah tails.
We found each other and held onto
each others skirt hems-- crawled into
the bowl as elephants or crows 
or doves-- no one believed we were doves.
We had always liked the rain--
held each other's trunks and pretended
to be a pair-- two by two
and two by two and crumb feet 
and cheddar scale in Noah's cereal bowl
perched on the counter top.
I had always liked the rain--
two by two and broken elbow and
watching for the black new moon
over the lip of the bowl.

Poison mushrooms 
and other accidental acts of suicide.

1.
We sold our tents to the blue jays
so that they would stopping calling us
names. Slept on each others shoulders and
split every pack of oats and honey granola bars in half
until we ate the wrappers too-- shiny-plastic enveloped 
our tongues to savor the last pieces of
food we had packed. 
We had wanted to hike
all the way on the Appalachian spine 
to escape the brownies we left burning in
the oven--
We only made it across the street
to the playground where we both re-learned 
our bodies as hunter gatherers.
We ate Galerina mushrooms not knowing they would
take five days to turn our kidneys to limestone.
2.
We didn't know better. We only knew how to make
brownies and how to pull up the grass
at night like a quilt.
I used to love blue jays until
I met them. They spattered hair gel 
in their crests and elbowed their brothers
when they came up with another way
to say "whore"-- flapped their wings at
us like fly swatters when we tried to sleep
underneath the big Red Oak tree where
all the birds live out of blank craft store
tree houses and only the cardinals
still remember how crochet nests.
3.
The cardinals shared their twigs with the blue birds
who were left to nest on the ground next to us.
They were too shy for branches
and didn't want to know what other words
the blue jays could come up with to say "ugly"
or "small" and "whore".
We've always been too shy for branches--
us and the blue birds-- only the blue birds
didn't eat the mushrooms.
4.
They taught us how to make a crossed-leg-- 
soil-kneed existence-- build our
own soft wrists from pieces of moth tails
left over from the summer-- made
mosaics from broken bark across our chest--
We learned how to make brownies from
cut squares of moss-- let the sun simmer
the dirt warm and soaked and moist--
lift each slice-- dug out with your finger nails.
We were creative enough to live on imagined taste. 
We carved pumpkins-- fed the seeds to
the blue birds so that they could grow
the gourds in their bellies-- shoot
vines from their beak and get sown back into
the moss where they nested. They had warned
us about the mushrooms-- but we pretended 
not to remember them-- counted days on our
fingers before we fell asleep--
5.
Woke up like always-- on each others
shoulders to the smell of blue jays wings
and the rising body count of the dead Oak leaves
around our ankles. 
We had liked the taste of the Galerina mushrooms.
It was the blue jays who told us we could eat them.
And they didn't taste like mushrooms.
They had tasted like gum drops or licorice twists
or not-burned brownies slightly uncooked in the center--
oozing like moss and soil.
We had gathered our way into the dirt with
the blue birds and the other
animals that burrow in the winter-- taken
by the mushrooms-- shifted our insides
into the dust of limestone--
We could still hear the blue jay laughing as
we felt our shoulders grow together.
Become moss.
Sleep under Red Oak trees.
Become mushrooms.

The Tuesday out a train window
over blueberry scores and shuttering tea.

We burned our tongues in chai tea--
broke sticks of cinnamon and dusted our
hands in the spice to help us wake up
each morning. Without the smell on
our wrists it
would be hard to tell each day from
the next-- same sauntering-- tap-dance
over the tracks helped us forget
that we used to have names for the days 
of a week like Wednesday and Sunday-- and I still
somehow miss Sunday. I think Sunday might have
worn yellow hats and baked berry tarts
and always had a tea kettle on the stove--
We ordered blue berry scones awhile ago
but they never came-- either that or you
ate them without telling me.
Time doesn't pass the same on the train. 
We demanded the window seats-- there
would be no point of travel otherwise--
dangled ourselves like a pair of counterfeit
crystal earrings there-- held hands and forgot
to talk to each other-- undulated in the clatter of the 
spoon-playing kneed train.
Everyone could play harmonica and I borrowed
yours because I left mine elsewhere. The train could
play out the rhythm and we followed her over
every track-finger snap-- loose-jaw clack 
and choral moan of her wheels sighing
whenever we passed water. They didn't check 
tickets before we went on. They didn't check
backpacks or purses. They didn't smooth 
their hands over our hips to feel if we were
women or men or hiding explosives.
We ordered blue berry scones. 
My mother asked where we were going and
I had wanted to make up some story about
Finish countrysides or the hills of Scotland
both of which I only imagine as green 
but I told her the truth. 
told her that we had wanted to see
our lives outside a train window-- watch 
until life turned into a film reel spun 
across eye lids-- blinked only when it started
to get dark and the sky made a dark room
for us to make photo albums from our seats--
I said 
hurry up before it's bright again and they
bring us more tea-- 
and the tea always burned our tongues
but we never learned different-- the train's 
oscillating waltz kept us in a trance--
we slept walked in our seats and saw
a thousand images of ourselves walking
across green fields in Finland and Scotland
where we had never been before-- we passed
a bazaar in Dehli where we bought more cinnamon
sticks for the chai tea and the night to come--
We wrote the same poem everyday with new words
and fell in love with each other again 
every time the train slowed down to let elephants 
or cows or manatees creep across the tracks
by the moon. I forgot your name and almost called
you Sunday because it was the only name I could remember.
We stopped sleeping through the night
and started counting days differently by the number
of times we saw ourselves outside the window
and number of times we remembered to order blue
berry scones. 
You named me Tuesday-- and I thought it was fitting.
And the train stopped but we kept 
swinging in our chairs and the tea in the cups
still shimmed side-to side.
And it was still bright in the window.
And there was a clock.
And there was a station.
And there were only a thousand versions of
ourselves waiting to board without
backpacks or tickets or explosives.
You said we shouldn't leave before we try
the blue berry scones we had ordered.
I told you I knew you had eaten them
and you said sorry, but not for eating
the scones, for lying about eating them.
And we walked off the train just
to pass another pair of ourselves
get on board. We told them to not forget that
the tea is always hot and to order
blueberry scones to remind you of
the days of the week. He said 
tuesday, tuesday-- my Love.

Climbing the shadows of tree trunks to 
a heaven on potato rolls and sun dried knees.

I've been sleeping in the forest since I can remember.
My father had plucked me from a branch
and used a bushel of white peaches to make my 
body-- each fruit bullied and bruised each other
in the wooden crate. Their scars turned to sickly syrup 
where they used to be white and princess cheeked--
Their skin melted away into the soil of December--
each smelled each other decaying
like the bottom of wet socked shoes. Dying 
slick in each blood-clot red maple leaf
dislodged from the brains of morning storm 
brains for the trees-- 
I was seven gory-peach-pits old.
I was a hand full of a magenta hearts. 
I was seven gory-peach-pits old 
and I knew I could climb trees at least 
the height of a swing-set-- we all could climb
shadows back then and only trip once-- scrape
knees to get the best bandaids--
We grew from those scab-coated-stones. 
Fractured-- flutter-kicked our way through 
the soil until we could breathe in heavy-- 
coughed out the leaves and frost 
and spat the strands of thin worms from our noses-- 
shook free from nests knit of weed and root-- 
the foliage quilt that tried to keep us for herself. 
By the next year I had flourished into seven 
tooth-pick wristed trees. My shadow friends were all there too. 
Moved with me-- chased me-- mimicked my hands--
made puppets-shows of my elbows-- ate the cheese
of my potato roll pizzas while I was too
busy growing each of my seven necks--
They collected their softball visors 
and soccer shorts. Collected the stains from grass blood 
and pizza sauce. We ate pizza at anyone's birthday party
when we all turned seven trees tall at the same time.
They used the shadows of my trunks for picnics-- 
Strung together their yo-yos into hammocks--
built the limbs into rungs of ladders-- 
steps to each of Jupiter's moons-- 
the celestial orb islands on the creek-- 
stuck silk scarves in the ground as flags-- 
made a colony of wet socks in shoes 
and sun-dried knees on asphalt.
I saw myself there-- potato roll pizza in hand and
carcass of a gushing peach in the other-- I was
tall as each peach tree-- syrupy-bruised and fading brown
in the sun-- the caramelized child of another 
October to be born again in the swelling of seven
blushing peaches. When did we grow to big too be supported
by tree shadows? Did we forget our
friends who envelope the bed room at night--
they wait under the bed-- tossing pit pits
like yo-yos and counting the days till
we turn seven-trees tall again.

He died my hair red and fed me marinara sauce.

Out of the ash I rise with my red hair
and I eat men like air -Silvia Plath

He told me I was a RED girl. 
red tongue--
red running face-- red raspberry rose rings
around my eyes that were supposed to be sleeping--
He took me by the shoulders-- by the clavicle--
all the places where boys find handles
on a girl-body-- crumpled me quick--
Tossed me as tissues-- stuffed me hastily back
into the box to be re-contorted again and again--
wipe blood from boy noses and knees.
He laid my body limp inside a brown-skin suitcase--
filled in the empty spaces with 
all my favorite pairs of old underwear--
threadbare with frogs and daisies and
soft-serve ice cream stains--
with the rainbow stripes-- 
with a white-laced waistband not yet afraid 
of how much blood we have waiting
inside our throats-- behind our finger nails--
coiled still blue and reptilian in our veins.
He told me I wasn't supposed to be a BLUE girl--
told me to stop falling into suitcases and start
wearing RED underwear like he wanted-- 
like Christmas girls-- wrapped present girls
RED bow girls in rows--
He didn't care if it was RED-blood or raspberries 
so I soaked my panties in my own sugar and
called myself a honey comb where all the bees
waited patiently for him to eat his fill--
fill his coffee mugs until he drank me
as bloody as a pomegranate-- called me 
temptress-- called his little eve with
the long sweater sleeves-- picked me backup by the
handles and told me it was time I eat something
besides berries-- told me to cup my
hands to hold marinara sauce-- wipe the leftovers
on my jeans-- break my bones into bread sticks 
and take garlic into my seams. 
He thrust my head over a sink and told me
no one wants a BLUE girl-- dyed my hair 
red and I saw BLUE go down the drain--
told me to remember each time I look
in a mirror the color in my hair is the
color he could make all my skin
if he wanted to-- told me that girls can't
hide themselves in blue long enough to 
become a boy-- fed me my own bread stick bones
and mused at the stains on my jeans.
But he didn't know how RED we all are--
that no hair color could make me forget 
my blood-- my blood remembers me each month--
my blood is in my fingernails-- my tongue--
my blue veins. 
So I let you dye my hair RED.
And you thought you took me in a suitcase.
But out of the ash I bake new bread stick
bones-- my hair was RED before you
and it will be RED after you and it will
be ash dusted and blue-veined
to eat you like 
marinara sauce, air, and 
raspberries stain.