baby deer

we find them grazing on the side
of the highway & pull over.
the deer still have 
their velvet. i know what it was like
to be hungry in front of 
an audience. we pluck leaves.
tell them, "come home with us
& be our children." 
earlier today
in the infusion center
the person on the other side
of the separator from us
talks the whole time about her babies.
you put in ear plugs
but i listen. she says,
"my toddler talks & worms come out."
she says, "i always wanted to graze
on the side of the highway."
i wanted to interject & say,
"i have too." though i know i would not be
a cautious enough deer. i would be
the little road kill angel. 
lay flowers in my ribs. the deer sit
& watch television. we show them
the cartoons we liked as children.
the deer want to go to space camp.
then they want to stay up
watching horror movies. 
their friends come over.
hoof print on the ceiling.
i told you before we picked them up,
"i don't know how to be a body."
i was trying to say,
"i love our children" by which i mean
the ones we don't have. 
do you know what it's like
to want what you don't want?
the deer eat dandelions. the deer learn
how to get the mail. how to make
boxed mac & cheese. they sing
to themselves & then to us.
i go alone to eat leaves by the side
of the highway. i want to know 
who i was before them.
you drive by & find me. we have
no deer. you are worried. you don't know
where i went. i apologize until 
i have antlers. you climb them
& build yourself a tree house there. 

twin spearmint bushes 

on the porch, we ate our hands.
the storm had a shiny baseball bat
& he smacked the rooves of every house
on the mountain. deer ran, carrying
photo albums in their teeth. 
raccoons trying to catch their own hair.
birds with gps pulled up in the hearts.
take me to the next heaven. 
a good july storm will shuck you.
i remember running inside
& closing the blinds
as if to say, "no one is home."
my two spearmint bushes still outside
pounded on the door. they said,
"we remember when the television 
was white as gold." i did not know
what they were talking about.
they were trying to say anything to get inside.
i dreamed of them as house guests.
all of us, myself & my two spearmint bushes
sitting on the couch. their roots 
entangled with mine. one telling me,
"it is not so bad to have to drink the sun."
storm snarl. the lighting knitting a fracture
in the sky's porcelain laugh. 
wind came & undid those two plants.
i tasted their ringing on my tongue.
their eyelids still on the windowsill 
readying for tea. i said i was sorry.
the storm did not. i went to sleep & dreamed
of the roof torn from the throat.
a cloud peering down at me 
& admonishing, "you left them alone."
spearmint growing in the walls. spearmint
busting in door. when i woke
the sky was vanilla again. i went out 
& i found the twin spearmint scattered
across the sidewalk. i picked them up.
i wept. they were speaking in a language
of colors. "blue, black, white."
they survived but they never forgave me.
when i drank their tea it tasted 
like walking backwards. 

for the garter snake

i would bring him pennies in case he'd like
to buy a bicycle. i don't know
what snakes crave. maybe a perfect
halo of sun. enough to take the blood
into thunder. i used to meet him at the edge
of the yard where the neighbor's trees
talked to themselves. the snake would 
knit words into the ground.
"please" over & over. i always wondered
if someone had taught him the word
or if it had come to him naturally. 
sometimes our mouths are cellar doors.
take me into the mess. i brought him
a can of soda to share with me.
then, i brought him a picture of 
my grandfather & asked the snake
if he thought we looked related.
the snake said, "more." the gaps 
in our language were like water over rocks.
sometimes i would ask him,
"do you think i could cut it as a snake?"
that would always make him 
run away. i like to think he was shy
but truly i think he knew i was just searching
for any kind of escape. into a new species.
into a new horror. this is my life pattern.
running through rings of fire.
one day the snake did not return.
i had brought him a flute in case
he liked music. i ran my fingers
through the grass. found nothing but
a soda tab from the drink i'd tried to share.
do you know what it's like
to crave a collapsed distance? 
i want to hear him confess everything
he's ever wanted to confess. 
then, i want him to listen to me.
i don't know if we'd have to go
one word at a time. i can bend my body
into a "please" too. i already have so many times. 

brutalist love poem

if you hold me at an angle 
i am perfect i promise.
i walk around the house
with a knife in my mouth.
it goes right through my tongue.
what if you held me like? what if
the peaches came this year in squares?
we could stack them & make a real house
instead of the tunnel. i paste a picture
of us as shadows in the hallway
you never notice it but i do
each time i pass by it grows
another pair of arms. soon there will
be enough to pick me up out of myself.
once, i ground up a rib 
& snuck it into our dinner without telling you.
you thought it was the most delicious 
i've ever been. sometimes you will 
blind fold me & walk me out 
onto the roof. wind shaves me down
to just a thumb. you take the blindfold off
& all i can see are search lights.
in this kind of place there are 
no memories. i tie them into knots
to try to keep one or two. that time
you held me & treated me like silk.
the other time when you drove me
into the lake & told me to get out.
"if you listened to me you would know how."
i couldn't remember what you said.
the car alarm going off. i stand in the front yard
& i cannot believe the house is standing. 
it is built of haphazard yearning 
& a lot of folds. corridors that snake.
god's forked tongue. do you remember 
the egg? how smooth it was? my fingers
across the surface. i don't know anymore
if it was real or if it was just what i invented
to keep myself alive. the earth gets rounder.
another door grows like a scab 
from the ceiling. 

lessons in herbalism 

don't eat the plant if it says, 
"i am urgent today." it is always best
to ask permission before devouring
a halo. sometimes we think we can
cure the butter melting through our ribs.
other times we are bold & we let it happen.
come birds. come wild hogs.
i take a handful of plantain leaves
to make a poultice. i am stung by bees
every single time i open the door.
mostly because i ask if they would
be willing to make me a drone.
i don't mind turning my brain off
if the task is honey. once, i took from
a wine berry bush without asking
& it bit off my fingers. i felt like
that was a fair trade. after all, they were
the best berries i'd ever had. 
i couldn't get the taste out of my mouth 
for days. later, when i passed the bush 
it said, "i miss you." i love how 
plants can play hard-to-get. i love how
one day they are twisted & teeth-ridden 
& the next they are begging to be harvested.
i guess i can relate to that. sometimes
i want a reaper to come & help me
grow out my hair. a corn field on my head
& then harvest it to make dolls.
i am convinced that one day i will find
a little fist growing in the woods.
it will belong to me. cut it from the earth.
every mushroom is an ear to the shadows.
of course they talk about us.
i take out my tongue. roll it up.
press it into the dirt in exchange for
the last pawpaw in the forest. 
i eat it without knowing
whether or not it is as sweet
as i dreamed it would be. 

brother 

he calls me to tell me there is
a hole in his wall.
i ask him
if he made it
& he says "yes."
i tell him to look through it
& explain to me what he sees.
"there are stag beetles 
& handcuffs," he says.
i know this is not a good sign.
i try to remain calm.
to be an older sibling
is to always be a hatchet.
you are what is reached for
when there is a bear 
at the back door.
i ask him if he can
get in his car & drive to
the nearest wawa so we can
eat bananas & talk about
how to get out. 
he says, "how would i do that
without any legs."
the line turn to pineapple
& stings my mouth.
i go to the upstairs
where no one will notice
& i make my own hole
in the wall. i see the same.
stag beetles & handcuffs. 
now, also, a little man 
without a face. 
i patch the wall. his stare
haunts me. i am not sure
if he is my brother or me.
i call my brother 
over & over but he doesn't
pick up again.
get in my car with 
what's left of my legs.
drive until there is 
no more sunset to spend.
weep in a wawa parking lot
just to find him there
drinking lemonade
& praying to a new idol 
he's found. i hold him
& ask him if he would consider
joining me in spending
a whole weekend 
both of us just the size
of beans. he refuses.
he had a garden in his head. he has
a thunderbird to catch & release. 
before i know it 
he's gone again & i am there
with no one to call. 
the telephone goes
right to the sky's belly button.
i let it ring & ring.
leave a voice mail 
for god or my brother.
"please let him be okay," i say.

chocolate gramophone 

i sold my last noise
to a passing wolf.
he had a use for it. he wanted
to call his lover from past the veil.
i wanted to speak chocolate
all my life. open my mouth
& have the truth come out
bitter & smooth. i used to dance
to my father's records. he put his hands
in the attic & everyone was safe.
i no longer want to be myself.
i want to be someone 
no one dislikes which is to say
i do not want to be alive or dead.
let's call this a waltz then. i mean truly
i have no idea what a waltz even is.
probably it involves swaying 
& someone you want to elope with.
i carry you into the tangerine winter.
snow falls. the snow is not snow. 
it is chocolate as are my eyelashes.
as are our melting birds. 
put that song on that neither of us
can name anymore. it goes something
like the collapse of a face. 
conch shells in the yard. do you think
the first person to listen to the ocean
just fell inside the sound's mouth?
god i hope they are still there, floating.
i don't get sick of eating fury.
snakes sun themselves 
on our house's steps. i bring them
shards of mirror to feast.
in doing so i'm asking them
if they have tried 
the most bitter dark chocolate.
they shake their heads. i say,
"you haven't lived until you do." 

NO FREEDOM written on a curbside mini fridge

in the city, we shed apartments like exoskeletons.
our dumpsters day after a move from the building
are always full of shreds of couches & piled broken lamps.
life spits out our shoes. we run away inside 
a conch shell. a birdhouse. it rains & we go
to try to salvage & reuse what we can. wires 
like forgotten snakes. upholstery soaked to the bone.
mini fridges are common. this one looks as if it were
smacked with a baseball bat. was it anger or hunger?
is there a difference? i open the little mouth to check
the teeth. if i crawled inside the mini fridge & waited for
garbage people to take me, do you think they would
deliver me to a secret holy land? the opposite
of a landfill. instead, a place of removal. 
the "no freedom" spray painted on the machine's side
tells me someone has tried already & failed. 
i can see them pressing their form into the fridge's
cramped mold. every time i move, i spend a week
or so basking in a fantasy that this place
will be better. less bugs. more ceiling. less neighbors'
late-night homilies. more sugar for walls. rain
melting them away. i will regret not taking
the mini fridge. regret not filling it with my own eyes.
they grow back each time i pluck them. grape vine.
ghost. grain. instead, the next morning
garbage truck comes to ask, "what do you want
to forget?" the building answers with the debris 
no one else has taken. the building is a lesson
in how close we come to living one another's lives.
i could have filled it with pigeon wings. i could have
stayed inside forever. felt the cool breath.
the shutter. the wave. the fists we use for doorknobs. 
let go & all the keys fall. they sound like bells. 

dead zone

the mountain doesn't like it when
i try to call you.
rounding
the rock tongue bend
i always lose your call. watch your voice
turn into a hawk. it goes off
to kill what it must. i know that soon
we will both be living in pockets.
using a shovel to dig
holes in the wall 
to hide our eyes. we see what 
we want to see. we hear
what we want to hear.
i tell you, "i am not alive anymore."
you hear,
"let's get married & kill the moon."
you say,
"i almost became an angel tonight"
& i hear, "let's run away
& eat nothing but syrup." 
the mountain keeps all the words
we do not say to each other 
when the line cuts off. 
"i am just waiting" & "when are you"
& "there was that time 
when we kissed in the belly
of a whale." it turns these sentences 
into garland. white flowers & sometimes
fresh berries. the little decoration
hangs above my door
when i get home. i kill a centipede 
& thumb tac it to the wall
as a warning to the others.
you said you would call back.
you try & try but the cliffs take
every attempt. i hold the phone
like an orphaned shoe. 
my love
where do we go to speak?
i can meet you
at the cave. i can meet you
in a cloud. i know we are not
what we say we are anymore. 

train station

bring your bees home. feed 
the sun your daily handful 
of buttons. we do what we must
to remind the earth to keep going.
we go to the creek. wear our own
mushroom veils. you tell me,
"i find the old bottles here"
& we spend all day digging them
from the rocky soil. i fill each of mine
with tongues. a secret is a place
you get to keep yourself 
or so i have always thought. 
where no one else can see
the color of your teeth. keep my thumb
over the bottle mouth. on the couch
you say to me, "i need you to tell me
the truth." i think of the train station
up the street & of throwing 
the bottles on the tracks. whispers
drowned out by the tumbling engine.
we go there & wait for the trains
to go by. only then do feel like i can shout
everything into the pear-skin wind. 
this kind of breaking welcomes water.
falling in. the ravenous sun.
you shouting too. the words
turned into cicadas. they get away &
burrow like bottles. inside
each of mouth, a piece
of my runaway. when you find me again,
i will be inside a bottle.
rinse me out in the sink.
stick a flower in my mouth. 
talk to me then. you can
tell me anything.