what do i look like?

i rub the mirror raw
until there is only water.
in the mailbox, there is nothing
but screaming. i put my ears
in the wood stove
& listen to the red horse.
sometimes i see myself in pictures
& i am convinced it is an actor
who has been hired to play me.
not even a very good look alike.
on tiktok i watched 
a hallucination simulation. 
i thought, "mine are usually better."
of all the utensils i think
it's safe to say i most closely resemble
a spoon. vessel garden 
where we pot our hands
in the hopes of oak trees.
the raven says, "lower taxes"
& i am naive because i try to ask
follow-up questions like,
"will you actually help us?" 
i already know the answer is
"no & i am going to eat your arm."
it is best to duct tape saviors 
& put them on the moon. 
corvids are the best kind of radio.
a blue asks me, "whose land 
was stolen today?" i try to make a list
but the list turns into a snake
& escape between the rocks.
my life feels like a handful
of salt. i touch a grain to my tongue. 
stop showing up 
in movies as an extra. instead,
i find my eyes always in bowls
of soup. i can see too much 
& i don't sleep. 

blue bath towel

in the death box, i always used
the same towel to dry my body.
steam on the bathroom mirror.
i never wiped it off
instead thrived in the blur-pastel portrait
it left of me. it is not possible 
to find yourself. or, at least, i never was
very good at it. i went to the city 
of hungry souls. walked down 
avenue of the americas like i was 
not just a girl in a little blue towel
from target.  
upstairs the neighbor made
his horror mash. shoes throw
at the floor. my blood grew windows.
from them i could see all of my lives.
each of them on fire. i called home
only one holidays. i would say,
"i am so big." meanwhile i pinched
grains of salt. let them dissolve on my tongue.
the towel hung on the back 
of the bathroom door. often grew wings.
once, i had to catch it as if tried
to escape out to front door.
it is an emergency when you notice
even all the objects trying to leave you.
i begged the towel,
"please, you can be so warm."
it was true, though mostly
i left her mildew ridden & damp. 
sometimes, the day after i did the wash,
i would find her breathing.
i fed her thimbles of diet coke
& sometimes a jolly rancher or two. 
the not-sugar & the sugar. i like to think
maybe we were either side
of a buried stone. i still remember one night
when i laid in bed for hours 
wrapped like a fresh corpse in the towel.
i was trying to think my way out
of a night. find the pastel world 
where there was nothing more 
than stories about faces. 

company

all week i walked to the graveyard
without a nose. my legs had given up 
on being real. all the ghosts were
watching the shopping channel 
& buying useless kitchen toys. 
i would sit with them. it was sophomore year
& i survived between breaks by cat-sitting.
stayed at the window house 
where i pretended to be someone else's child.
the vacant bedrooms. in the yard 
bamboo that could not stop talking
about "the big city." we all have dreams
just some of our dreams are punishments.
i loved to eat at the end of the long dining room table.
you could tell she liked to entertain.
so many plates. all my faces reflected in them.
i slept on the sofa in the front room
by the fake fireplace. the graveyard got closer
every day i was there until there were
headstones in the front yard.
i worried aloud, "what am i going to do 
with you?" the cats stared out
at the new dead garden. i put a finger
to my lips & begged them, "do not tell
your mother." cats are, if nothing else,
enamored with secrets. i never wanted
to leave. i only regret not having the ghosts
in for dinner one night. we could have played
cootie catchers & confessed all the ways
we have died. when i left, their packages came. 
brownie pans & knives. i buried each
to the spirits' delight. by the time she returned
the cats were walking on their people legs
but, to my relief, the graveyard was gone.
i still miss them sometimes. the obelisks 
& the smoothed face stones. late october sun. 
a chill that never leaves my teeth. 

texas roadhouse 

this is how i like to remember you
even though you are not dead.
it was between lunch & dinner
& we were the only ones 
in the texas roadhouse off old 222.
we are far from texas 
in our pennsylvania weeds. 
an uncle & his nephews: me & my brother.
our server's name was "paisley"
& that prompted you to teach me
what the pattern looked like.
you drew it on a napkin & i thought,
"centipede wedding." we ate ribs.
you are not dead but now you stand
in the driveway with a flag in your mouth. 
i haven't talked to you 
in years. sometimes when i visit home
you are still eating those ribs. 
wiping the barbeque sauce on a nice shirt.
it looks like old blood. we ordered
a chocolate lava cake to share
between the three of us. you still call me
my old name. in those moments 
we trade places. i am the undead one. 
truthfully i'm not sure who is dead anymore.
the hot chocolate poured from
a wound in the cake. i licked my fingers.
you laughed. my brother used his fork
to plunder the whipped cream.
everything was easy & none of us had
to have a gender. in the dark you watch
your horror videos. all the tongues
like ribs. a paisley pattern knit across
the screen. i don't know how or why
you changed or if you always wanted
to be this angry. i don't eat meat anymore.
the texas roadhouse is closed & replaced
with a raising canes. my blood turns 
to lava when i see you. i look for a wound.
pouring out on a white plate. not enough time. 
let's not pretend anymore. let's be dead
or not. tell me, do you remember 
that afternoon too? will you come 
& draw me paisley on a brown napkin again?
i just want something to keep. 

blown egg

i break the shell with my own makeshift
egg tooth: a bent leg fork. 
have you ever had someone
put their lips to your ear
& blow? i have felt all my yolk 
mix with my veil. a bleeding daylight.
washing my hands over
& over in the bathroom. i counted down
from one hundred while he did
his blender speaking. i walked with him
as far as the land knew how to carry us.
we grew children beneath the dirt.
already roots. ghost carrots & leeks.
the shell, like a windchime house.
never enough light
to see the moon's evil twin. i try
so many times to tell him
what he is doing to me & instead
all that comes out is guts. my guts.
he strokes my head. braids my hair
& chops it off with a butcher knife.
eats it. fish tail. frog house.
i am trying to find someone to believe me
when i say there was a little chicken
in my head once. i loved him & now 
all his gold is in the sink & my lover
is promising me i have always been 
this hollow. he carries the feathers
of a million birds to my door.
knocks until the house comes apart.
this is why i empty every egg i find.
lips to the skull. blowing until
i see fairy dust in my vision. 
close one eye & peer through the hole.
it gives me a tiny motion picture.
there is a boy but he is just
an outline. there is nothing at all inside
but a flock of lips. they mutter,
each a fresh instruction.
i crush the egg in my hands only once
it is vacant. it feels like cracking open
my own skull. i had hoped 
something, anything, would escape. 
he makes the world's biggest omelet
& i watch him devour each bite. 

benches 

during the year we died five times
i watched the benches turn
into horses. they always wanted
more than just the apple core.
i started to bring dates & honey. ankles
& a hooved moon. i went there
to sit with my bouquet of teeth 
& my heaven pill bottle. the tourists came
& took pictures of the sky.
the sky covered her face & bruised.
sometimes a hand would emerge
& puppet talk until i acknowledged him/her.
if not for my spearmint bush
we would have all starved. my green guts
& my green face. i put the dogs in my lap.
they turned ragdoll & then into papayas.
my mom would call & ask, "what does it feel like
being dead?" i would shrug. 
describe the smell of centipedes.
i invited a date once & she only talked
about wanted to fly an airplane. i bought her
one & she wept. she said, "why would
you do this to me?" i know i have
honeymoon tendencies. nectar
from the faucet. bridle on the bench.
my favorite thing to do was to sit
with dead men. they told me
to try on their clothes. fashion shows
for the morning tangerine. a mountain god.
i helped roll them into little balls
of lint. the dryer caught fire
but i kept using it. turned each dress
into ash until my skin was bare.
the dead men bent down. begged to be
new benches. i explained, "that is not
how to die." so, i showed them.
you start with the hands. left & then right.
down your throat. then, you close your eyes
until they turn into pearl in their sockets.
the rest comes easy. the breading
& the frying. the cold bench back.
the headlights carving pumpkins
in my skulls. 

tactics for killing flies

don't get in the habit of making confessions
to them even if you are lonely
& even if the drain in the sink
is a mouth. this became my trouble.
i would reach my hand inside
& let each finger be an orphan. 
the flies welcome me as one of them
& i try to tell them this is a bad idea.
i have never placed a window on my back
nor have i perched in the mashed flesh
of a gone pear. they say,
"you do not need to know how
to be hungry." don't open the doors 
one day when you are trying not to die.
don't let the wind turn into horses 
& the closets, to landfills. it is best
if you do not learn their language.
when you start speaking to them
then you start wanting to keep them around.
never feed them. it is crucial you do not 
feed them. even if they offer
to sing you a song in exchange for a peach. 
even if you have not
spoken to another human in years.
even if the neighbors are turning
one by one becoming crows in the night. 
once you do, they will arrive & form
a buzzing beard on your face.
i have lived into private deadly hopes.
ate plums in the mirror. sugar waits 
just a spoon away. i took them up once
on the singing. ave maria. holy ghosts.
insect angels with the midday light
making ambrosia of my face.
i get a spoon. i still don't have
the guts to call you. instead, i sing
with the flies. they give me permission
to wallow in my lostness. you should
never let them in. crush each like periods.
the days' doorknockers. when we talk
again, i'll teach you how to say "please"
just like the flies do. 

declines in church attendance  

i fill the church with whales.
everyone is going to marvel at this feat. 
i invited them with a big pile
of shoes. anything can be communion
when you are an escapee. 
i do not remember what was 
the last time i went to mass. 
my soul is probably full of holes. my soul
is probably not even good for straining pasta.
i do not worry too much about it.
i think me and my family are purgatory 
kind of people. it is always better to wait
than to arrive. i'm sure the afterlife
is a big let down. the whales though,
the whales know exactly what to do
with the big belly space of the church.
tail in the sacristy. their bodies 
in the saltwater laughter. in a way
i have never really been baptized.
none of them ever stuck. my original sin
comes back, primordial & wise. 
the whales are baptism monsters.
i consider asking them for help 
but decide they should just enjoy getting
to be this holy. 
overflowing fountain. they feast. demand more.
i bring them hair & nails. i bring them
wafers & even the advent robes. 
i wonder if i want to become a whale
or if i want to worship one. they tangle.
swell until they break the chandeliers.
become priests in their hugeness. 
it is sunday & i consider giving the homily
myself. standing up at the podium
smashed between whales. 
my own baleen spirit, sifting
in the red velvet dark. i find nothing
but krill & bugs that have drowned
in the church's flood. no one hears me
but the whales. no one 
understands me but the whales.
no matter how much i beg though
they cannot let me be one of them. 
the stained glass is eventually
what will break but for tonight
we are flowered & folded. 
the moon ordains us & shines
in our dinner plate eyes. 

control room

i am building a button place.
one lever for the sweet water
& another for the milk room.
i keep my little beeping closet
where no one else can find it.
television monitors of the soup.
dear god i am out of thumbs.
if only there was a machine that could
count all the prongs on all the forks.
the air is too full of wings to breathe. 
i make sure that the red buttons 
always mean poppy fields & that 
the blue buttons mean we are
going to chew mint to death.
i trace the wires with my finger.
once, i had a lover who i brought here.
he was terrified. he covered his ears
& asked, "how do you survive 
with all this?" i pushed a button 
to release the eels. they took their journey
away from civilization & into
the honey ground. i was trying to say,
"i do not have a choice." 
he did not believe me. was disgusted.
saw that i was building onto the room.
everyone always thinks it is enough.
the room is never enough. bleeds
like a pomegranate. catacombs of jewel.
he did not understand. i will never be alone.
i have a nest of needles. a boat 
on which to sail right into 
the ghosts' wild face. no need 
to take the tongue from the oven.
smoke fills my voice. i take myself 
to the static edge. a flock of vultures. 
shut the door for the day. press my ear
to the husk to hear it hum.
i never saw him again but sometimes
i push a yellow button
& see just one of his eyes 
whale-like on my screen. 

scrap wood

every dad builds a time machine at some point.
i knew my father was working on one when
he started leaving in the morning before everyone else woke up.
he'd return with his jeep full of highway wood.
nails in jars all around the house. he kept
the basement door shut & locked as he worked.
didn't let anyone see. if you asked him what he was 
working on, he'd say, "not until it is done." 
everyone got splinters. that is the problem 
with family. you become the same organism.
the same hungers & the same urgencies. 
i dreamed only of scrap wood. where & how
to retrieve it. our fathers are sites of self-ending devotion.
i wanted to make him proud. once, i woke up
even before home. the world was dark 
& all the houses weren't real yet. i took several apart.
they were the vacant houses where there
used to be farms. i carried all the bones 
down into the basement. that is when i saw it.
this grand impossible machine.
buttons & lights & yearning. i stepped inside.
saw the "on" button & considered leaving. 
disappearing into a time when no one could find me. 
dinosaur flowers. a fresh moon.
instead i curled up & went to sleep.
i wanted him to find me. i wanted him
to be furious that i knew his secret.
he was not. inside, he lifted me,
like scrap wood, & carried me back to bed.
there he said, "you will understand
when you're older." i wish i would have asked him
where he wanted to go back to.
his childhood? to prehistory when
no one yet took a hatchet to the sky. 
i am older now & i still don't what he wanted
or what he wants. he still is collecting wood.
i am still, to the best of my knowledge,
the only person who has seen the machine.