for jolene 

when you think "taste"
what comes into your mind?
is it the dandelions i fed you
on the hill above the well?
the salt block in the yard? a mother 
memory of sweet ribbons 
in the dark? maybe our fingers close
to your nose? i will always think 
of us in the summer before
the metal folding chairs were crushed
& rusted. when we could still hold you
as we sat in them. when we marveled
at your softness & curiosity.
do you remember how the yard 
once had grass? how that first winter 
i brought you all blankets, scared
that the wind was too harsh?
if you had one more secret to give me
what would it be? i want to know
how the stars look when 
we turned the back porch light off. 
maybe if you could tell me that.
i want to jar your bleat & put it
in the cupboard next to the water-glassed eggs
& the walnuts. i cannot believe how high
you could leap. in the first days that you were here
i worried i would wake up
to find you on the roof. i did not but 
once i did find you on top
of the garbage can. i picked you up,
ending your game. i regret only 
not fighting off the boys more 
to make sure you got your piece 
of banana peel. i regret only 
not holding you longer when you
were smaller. i regret only
that the land asks for our beloveds back
& that why is always the wrong question. 
keep me where you go. 

apple tree

i saw the ghost of the apple tree
wearing a purple dress on the side
of the road. she told me she was
getting married. aren't we all getting married?
i don't want to be a turtle anymore.
i would like to have long legs 
& a keyhole to peer through.
the apple tree used to spit her face
in the neighbors' yard. they never
picked all the fruit. instead, the animals came.
had feasts. i always wanted to join them
in my own purple dress. i don't own
the dress anymore. who knows 
where it ended up. i used to be softer. 
i wish i was softer. instead i am bound by
laws about who owns the land. property lines.
a wooden fence. animals have always been
the best anarchist teachers. climb the trees.
eat the berries. shit on the roof. care for
the weak. sleep in the guts of an old tree.
i ask the apple tree why she stopped 
bearing fruit. she tells me that it was
too lonely. to create is always lonely.
even the sharing, like little deaths
in the mouths of those you love.
i think it would be way too proud
for me to claim to be an apple tree like her.
maybe i am a knuckle tree or an eyelash tree.
something less sweet & vital. i admit 
to the apple tree that once one of 
her fruit rolled close enough
to the side of the road that i was able to
snatch it up. i ate it right away. juice on 
my hands. all apples are tethers. all poems
then too. the purple dress hanging on the mailbox.
naked, the tree runs off. i tell her i am always here
if she wants to be devoured again.  

life coach 

i call the blender museum. they have
advice for me. i need to cut my life up
into drinkable pieces. guava. mango. yogurt.
someone walks back & forth up the road
& i go to see what they're all about. they hand me
a little business card & say, "i am a life coach."
i run away as fast as i can. i stay away from coaches
especially the life variety. i have a hard enough time
trying to swallow it all by myself. they are
everywhere. i collect the business cards
like trading cards. love. health. wealth.
one life coach says she just found god again.
i think "again?" i am glad i am not someone
who worries about the afterlife. instead i am worried
about bananas & how there used to be 
a different breed of banana that isn't here anymore.
then i am freaking out about species loss. what flavors 
have bombs eaten? what fingers? 
once when we were still together we were in a movie theater
& a life coach tapped me on the shoulder.
it was getting to the good part. i asked, "what do you want?"
she said, "the first session is free." i was
so desperate to be heard that i almost 
took her up on it. instead, you were jealous 
& ended up eating the business card. i was relieved.
a real exorcism is when you unburden someone you love
from themselves. my own desire to not disapoint. 
is it because i am an eldest child? is it because 
when i was younger i could talk to bees? 
still, sometimes that movie theater life coach 
came to the window. i would find her breath-print 
in the morning. sometimes, because i am sick,
i considered leaving the window open at night
to see if she would just come inside & fix me.
i do not want to put in the work. the plane you left on
was full of life coaches. then, too, the grocery store
i shopped in alone. aisles of life coaches.
the life coach in the woods & the life coach 
knitting baby hats on the bench. some people fear failure.
i fear becoming a life coach. that one day i will
find myself handing out business cards to pigeons. 
i know you are not supposed to feed the ghosts 
but i do often. i pluck out a few strands of hair.
one of the ghosts explains, "i am a death coach."
the horrors persist. the winter persists.
i get an add on instagram for becoming a certified 
life coach. i weep. i burry the phone. you are back.
you have never left. you are a life coach & you smile
like oatmeal. i say, "i want to sleep until i am a bird."
you say, "why do you hold your dreams by
the scruff of their neck?" 

roostless 

when the chickens cannot find a roost
they find a skull. pile on each other 
in the shoulder blades of the yard. 
i do not have a roosting instinct 
or even an instinct to come home when
the sky starts turning dreamsicle. 
i have tried to be a wristwatch person 
& even a person with wings. the middle
of the night chews my fingers. i stand 
on the roof, peeling lobes off the moon.
it is ripe & i am not sharing. the chickens 
use me as a roost. soon we will all 
return to dinosaur. i believe in cycles
& thus the age of giganticness is on its way back.
i am hoping to be a herbivore but the chickens
suggest that being a carnivore is more fun.
more of a chase. i tell the chickens i will
care for them even when we are dinosaurs.
the rooster would make a very good terror.
he wants daggers for teeth & a fossil 
on the other side of a dusty man's dream. 
those solar system models never quite catch
just how wild the orbit is. the moons
are looking for a roost they will never have.
the dinosaurs too have stories & poetry 
ready to breathe again. i think if we do not sleep
we do not have to grieve. we can keep moving
& the earth can keep moving & we can
go aquatic again. the chickens do not like
that idea. it rains microplastic. at first
i mistake a bead for a droplet of water.
on my tongue it feels prehistoric. a footprint
twisted into a pin-prick. i wait for the sun.
for the chickens to scatter & do their yard plucking.
worms who thought they could sleep in. 
i stretch. feel like a trash bag of coat hangers.
weep for my big cavernous organs. for the lizard
i will soon be. for the time the orbit will take
to make us massive & somehow still roostless.  

let me be less clear

i don't wake up like i used to. 
instead i consider becoming a walnut.
hearty & winter-ready. my fist, eternal. 
i used to order teeth in the mail
& send them back after using them.
it was greedy but you always have 
to game the system while you can.
they catch up to you. they password protect
the stars. sunglasses on the dashboard. 
everything has been getting louder lately. 
i put peanuts into my ears. i do not think
there is much left that i need to hear. 
i shoplifted jello in college 
but not enough. i used to believe
that the cop cars were always coming for me
so i would give my face to a squirrel
& tell them, "run while you can." i am sick
of having something to say. i want to be
like the rocks who take centuries 
to form a single word. they tell stories
only one another & the bones can read.
there is a man in my neighborhood who runs
miles & miles each day. i consider talking to him.
running to catch up. out of brief. his sneakers.
the cold january morning. i would
make up a story about my life. 
running along & telling him that the beautiful farm
at the end of the road is mine. has been
in my family for centuries. nothing has
been in my family for centuries besides hunger.
an emptied tongue. a wooden spoon ground down
on one side from once catching fire.
everyone wants to learn a second language.
i want to speak crow bird. sit outside
& make jokes with them about the purple berries
that humans cannot eat but they can.
our stomachs are like knots in the soil's belt. 
i have seen the truth. it is shivering
in the corner of the sky. lie to me until 
we are both happy. i want to eat from bowl.
i want to get on my knees. watch the house shrink 
in the dryer. lint sweaters for the rats. 
the rooster screams. it is still the dead of night. 

genie in a bottle

you can ask for more wishes. you can
rub every bottle in the house until it laughs. 
you can travel in the desert 
for years just to reach a stone. 
humans are not the only creatures
who have the concept of a wish.
the birds too, dip their beaks into the sky.
skim off the cream. hear the giants 
in the thunder. their boiling bones.
the story of the genie in the bottle is believed
to have come from a story of a demon
in a stone. the stone was black. probably obsidian.
museum locked, my partner & i look
at knives cut from the same rock. 
our reflections are birds in their mirrors.
all the flesh on both sides of a tool.
in the gutted house, we look for an allen wrench.
none of our friends know what that is.
the year is over & i have not wished enough
or i have wished too much. i can never tell. 
the neighborhood cats are wishing
on the moving truck. they rub the sides
with their cheeks. snow comes like
wedding rice. the story of the stone is
a cautionary tale. of what i am no longer sure.
i like to think i am better than a parable
but who would not touch such a structure
in the thirsty nowhere? the desert is endless. 
will drown you in dust. we all barter. 
his stone is cool to the touch despite 
the hammering sun. despite the color. 
on the other side, the demon, asmodeus, 
tells me to let him free. you can even ask
for more wishes. the lanternflies on hamilton street 
coax a demon from the shiny buildings. wish for
home. i am a third-generation hoarder.
i keep the wishes. i keep the lamp.
even keep the stone. 

unscathed 

i used to have a friend who kept her tail.
i asked to see it but she declined. it was
rude of me to have asked. i only have
six fingers, the rest were bartered
to a police station in the new york
where i tried to explain i was just trying
to get home. sometimes when i ask
my gps to take me home it brings me to the cemetery
on the big hill in my hometown. 
i do not try to stop it. we used to watch
the gnarled finger tree hole up the moon
like a communion wafer. beneath us
the dead held each other all the same.
i am trying not to think of everything in terms
of loss. what limb you kept to paddle 
the boat up the creek. i of course have
fragments of you. a window in the house
that turns stained glass despite my protestations.
my left shoe always untied. that article 
is going around again that says children leave cell
inside their mothers & mothers inside their children.
we are either rosary beads for the thumbs
of trees or we are skipped stones. i try to feed
our sick animal. she will not accept the food
even from my hand. as a child my father
used to have a rock tumbler that he would use
to process river stones & sell them. they were
smooth as whales. the evidence of loss. contours
in the world belly. i do not want to be 
smooth but i do want to sleep in someone's pocket.
i wish i could lay the losses out on
a little blanket like a street vendor. then when
the night comes, curl up in them. roll myself. 
a reverse carpet man. open me. see what you find. 

canceled plans

the moon texts me to say, 
"i can't do it tonight." there are 
secret police. there was a siren 
in the sky & i wasn't sure to what kind
of emergency sought to warn us of.
i tell the moon,
"it is probably better you stay home."
i am worried about when & if i will
see the street like it was the summer 
before my teeth fell out. i have to say
i love canceled plans. i hold them
like dream terrariums. there we are
as painted turtles. 
there we are watching the stars
buzz above the sink. my partner & i joke
about being opposites. he wants to 
always be out in the world 
i wants to stay inside. plant tomatoes 
in the floorboards & see what grows.
when the sun texts me too, i start
to worry. someone has to plant their feet
in the sky. i once climbed a lighthouse
with my whole family. i imagined 
living up there until i learned 
where wings come from. i break more promises
than i ever have. tomorrow. tomorrow.
i need to stop pretending like 
there are not cameras in the shape 
of men. that there are not laws that come
like parasite babies. a body to hold.
a body to hollow. yes let's try again
tomorrow when the moon is here & the sun
is making tea again. i don't know
if that will stick. if i do not see you
pretend i have seen you. we can sit in separate
horrors & draw pictures on the ceiling
of our garden. the moon is running.
i found her shoes in the yard. scuffed white sneakers.
i look up methods to distract a god.
my purse fills with cell phones. an empty car 
parked by the forest opening where
the hunters go to track down a buck.
i call you in the middle of an ice storm.
i say, "please be with me." 

rock climbing gym at night

in the dark, we reach for teeth.
i am trying & trying not to panic.
lately i have been feeling like a ten-year-old. 
reality bleeds. where does the blood
come from? i am in fifth grade & my stomach
is softer than it'll ever be again.
we eat windows. girls without genders.
i see a picture of friends from high school together.
wonder who i was then & if i was there at all. 
the rocks, still bright in the dark.
i put time in a blender. housing crisis.
recession. i was born into a wound
that never closes. the wall that gets taller 
& the spotter who leaves. no more legs
just the side of an animal. without
light you can pretend that you are
on the side of a great mountain. that they
will write legends about your hands.
reaching & reaching. one rock, a fist,
another a mouth, still wet from
chewing blue gum. i remember loving
the climbing. i felt like i could almost
touch the ceiling. in a dream, there is a tarot spread
on a table in a coffee shop that reminds me
of an ex. we ate afterwards. cake. it was
all of our birthdays. we were turning eleven 
or eleven was turning us. a garden spade
in the back, twisted. the soil coming 
to the surface. walls full of
all the colorful rocks. it was a sleepover. 
we lay on the floor. her house smelled gingham
or was it dull pink? i scaled the bathroom 
like it had rocks. we ended up on the roof.
i end up on the roof. i look up to see the sky is
dotted with orphaned teeth. some of them
must be mine. 

pour over

we were breaking up when
i started to get into coffee brewing methods.
the keurig had died. i thought maybe
we could be free. i tried
the french press & i tried the moka pot.
i ultimately settled on the pour-over
because the internet god told me
it was the strongest. god i loved 
how bitter i could make it. i was always awake
even when i was asleep. i once sat up to see i was
without any hands & i wept & you were
not there at all. 
we shared a room & i pictured
cutting everything in half. the bed
& the window & the desk which was mine
& became yours. i have never
been good at uncoupling. i draw things out.
try to make it work. try to make it work.
which is less about love & more about
bills & apartments & shoes by the door.
on my worst days i would stand & 
let the hot water's steam fog my glasses.
pretend  i was driving a car into a lake.
the smell of coffee blooming. the sound
of an ambient siren. police or ambulance?
i ask myself the same question. when we first came 
to the apartment we had no curtains. 
the light at everything. you watched me
make coffee once. you asked,
"doesn't that take longer?" i wanted to say,
"i need more time." ending do not 
wait for us. instead i explained,
"it's my favorite way to make it."