i am an alchemist of dead birds

they go to die on my windowsill
singing radio songs. static.
a crow. a cardinal. a blue jay. a hawk. 
this began the first time
i cradled a dead bird in my hands.
no one cares about dead birds. 
their bodies get absorbed into the asphalt 
& into the grass of parking lots.
when you care about a dead thing
it becomes just a little bit alive again.
what i really want 
is to ressurct them. i want to speak to the birds
so clearly they have to wake up. 
when i was small, 
i would try to wake up dead birds until 
the sunset came peaching above & it was time
to return home. in bed, i became a dead bird.
i felt all my bones. i splayed out. 
i came back to the same dead birds each day 
until their bodies melted away & then their bones.
right now, i can make a dead bird into 
a pocket watch, a pair of opera glasses,
or a compass. though, the compass
never points in one direction.
i am trying to broaden my craft
to other dead animals. there is 
a dead mouse somewhere in my apartment
but it is not responding to me when i whisper to it. 
one day i want to turn a raven
into a deep black umbrella. then maybe
a blue jay into a bow tie. there are
so many dead birds when you start looking for them.
then, they start looking for you.
i guess you could say i'm also
an undertaker of birds. everywhere
is a bird cemetry. i often wonder
if birds die in mid air & just plummet 
to earth or if they have an instinct 
that instructs them to land.
on the sidewalk once i found
only a wing without a bird. 
i searched for the rest of the body
& found none. the wing still had feathers
even though they were ragged & thin.
fried chicken bones count as 
a dead bird. who else is going
to show them into their afterlives?
god doesn't care about birds 
so we have to. i am up late
practicing bird calls from recordings i find
on Youtube. i am laying down
another pocket watch. a single wing
is beating without the other 
somewhere in the haunted night.

a future in which i am inevitably a chicken

you buy precooked chicken
in a little plastic container
from the grocery store because it's easier
than buying a chicken & sitting it on the stove
& telling it hush hush
this will not hurt.
the meat is cut into perfect slices
& i open the fridge to think about
where the flesh was on the body.
a wing? a chest? 
sometimes, to be sad, i watch videos
of huge farms. i don't believe they exist.
seas of chickens all trying to talk
over one another. they run like
toddlers. stumble. foot to fence. 
chickens climbing on each others heads
as if they could stack themselves 
towards some escape. i am not 
a chicken today & hopefully not tomorrow.
i used to have to cut chicken meat
at my deli job. the knife cubed breasts 
without much effort. meat is always 
becoming smaller & small pieces. 
with gloved hands, i would hold each 
lump of flesh steady as i worked.
touching animal. a far off heart beat. 
chicken feathers floated down 
from the sky at haunt me. simple feathers.
i collected them & burried them 
in the yard behind my dorm. 
in a factory somewhere the chickens
are singing to each other. they are maybe
unaware of their meat. 
teeth need chicken 
& so does our fridge & so does 
the plastic bag who would be lonely
if it were left empty of meat. 
someday soon my time will come
& i will wake up in a farm 
with all the loudness of the city.
i will try to write poems as a chicken
i am sure i will, but my chicken brain
will only flicker through images:
hand, plastic, beak, tooth, 
eggshell, god, light, fingers.
then a white darkness. flesh separated
from bone. bones ground up
into dust. dust inhaled. 
a fridge door smooching open.

nocturne

the neighbors upstairs are creating their own
organs & rearranging them. they roll 
stomachs across the wooden floor & hold 
their marbel eyes in their palms.
the world is hard & shatterable. i count
my teeth. in a room with no windows
you can easily convince yourself 
the sun has quit. has the sun quit?
often i live in a world where all my organs
turn into musical intruments but then
there are days i am full of rotting fruit.
a mango in my chest. a march of strawberrys 
up my spine. i fill my veins with neon.
i am a sign blaring only for myself.
what word i am? i think "glass"
or maybe the word "once."
can you tell something is wrong with me?
i can't most days. 
the neighbors are finding happiness 
in the fragments of their bodies. 
when i spin my heart nothing happens.
a rush of dizziness. i lurch.
are teeth an organ yet? will half dollars 
save me? i used to knit. 
i should pick it up again & knit myself
a body bag. slip myself inside
& pretend to be a knife. in the parking lot
behind my apartment i say goodbye 
to the dandelions who are rushing to turn
white. i am telling them 
to not waste their yellowness 
on anyone. boys
are not worth it & neither 
are pigeons. in my room i burn
the face of a daffodil & pretend 
it is my face. i feel the flames spreading.
the smell of a tongue fills the room.
a tongue is the best organ. the neighbors
are laughing. i bet they are
making a mess. i wish i were
making a mess. finger painting
with blood on the hallway. 
no don't worry it's just red paint.
i am not bleeding like that.
it's a slow trickle. a sink left on.
i am laying on the floor 
& looking up at the ceiling until it opens.

10 years old at the hair salon

a book of boy faces sings a song 
about fingers & teeth. smiling 
boy faces. stubbled boy faces.
posing boys with their grey backgrounds
& their blue eyes. their hair cuts 
are made of stair cases. outside the frame
the boys are all at beautiful locations 
like the side of a cliff or the ocean.
i am on my knees. in another book 
there are girl heads. everyone 
tilts their faces to the side. every book
is worn around the edges. is yellowing paper.
dad is here, bouncing his knee like he's 
a father machine. 
the clippers hum like they want to sing
but can't. my thighs brush up against each other 
like scissers' bladeds meeting.
i am trying to choose a head to be my own.
my own hair is too long. it bleeds 
down my back. the edges are frizzy.
each morning, mom tries to pull a comb
through my mess. i have dreams of bats
getting tangled in my hair. mom says
it's too messy to donate anywhere
not to hurt me just to be honest. 
i imagine being one of the models 
in the books. practicing a distant smile,
i stare off into the distance. i feel a camera 
hovering just out of sight. so many heads.
all across the page. all those bodies out of frame.
boy bodies with their coarse fingers &
their playground laughing. man bodies 
that always resemble my father.
families of people with great haircuts.
all the boy faces visit me like ghosts.
they tell me what i already know
which is that i want my hair so short
no one will recognize me. some of the faces
don't smile. some of them just 
press their lips together as if they're closing 
an entrance. the hair dresser makes small talk.
the pages of a magazine are being flipped. 
dad is looking around. i wonder if he's
counting the ceiling lights 
like i do. he could be a head 
in a book. i want to pose him.
take the picture 
on a stone-color background.

tomorrow 

i built a cathedral of wrists 
where the words were all stone & mumble.
a single red cherry dangles 
in my chest where a frog should be.
it rained frogs once & each time 
i start to notice droplets of water
coming down from my ceiling
i hope they'll be accompanied by 
amphibians. i lose a finger on each hand 
to the wolves. somewhere, there's a pocketknife
with someone else's name on it. 
if all your windows are made of dust
you never have to look out
not ever again. bags of sand slap
again the sidewalk. i'm falling over board.
my rowboat jostles in the water 
of my living room. the cathedral 
is not for worshipping just like
the sun is not for warmth. i grow a blue tree
from my veins. i smell a coral reef
in the sink. all i wanted was 
a swimming pool big enough to throw stones into.
ripples are briefly animal. all my teeth 
are ankles. here is your truth 
i am looking for it with a magnifying glass.
my life is a story if lopsided haircuts 
& broken dishes. i pull a shard out of my heel
& out pours all my secrets, loud & unstopable.
i know there is an angel assigned to me
because i never die. i know there is
a flower in the mailbox eating my letters.
that is why you never wrote me back.
what kind of planet is made of dirt?
whose back door is dangling just 
on the other side of the house. 
what will i be if i have nothing 
i can call a porch? my nail clippings 
are waiting to become moths
but i scoop them into the trash.
on the curb, everyone is almost
their shadow. mine asks me a question
which i ignore because once you respond 
to a shadow you never go back.
no friends. just shadow talking all day.
the cathedral wasn't much. it was more like
a doll house if i'm being honest.
no water in the sinks. no glass
in the windows. a door propped up against
the front door to keep it shut. 
an intrusion is impending. 
everyone is hungry. a fishing lure
lilts a few feet away. nothing good.
probably my father. it has a wad 
of potatoe roll on the hook.

spare

i once used a beach ball 
for a spare tire. i used a diamond ring
& a ferris wheel & a single baby tooth.
you can mae due with anything if necessary.
it is important to be imaginative 
when it comes to your own disasters.
on the side of the road with a flat tire 
i pictured the rest of the world in flames.
i told you we were on our way 
to hell. you told me you thought
we were just going to the supermarket.
the supermarket is a kind of hell.
the car wasn't a car but the carcass
of a small whale. i told you 
water had left the earth & now 
we have to drink sugar. i used to have
a spare tire in the trunk. it waited
coiled like a snake or no maybe
it really was a snake & it slipped out 
of one of the cracks in the floor of the car.
somewhere there is a snake 
who could have saved us. salvation 
is really a matter of preparation.
this is why i sometimes try to believe 
in god. i pray for a miracle. for a new car 
made entirely of glass. indestructable.
i pray for you to hear my thoughts
because it would be easier to love me 
if you did. i don't want to hear 
your thoughts though. i would give anything
to be a favorite person. i eat
a handful of grass. the ocean is rising
but i still can't see it from my window.
i could use a necklace as a spare tire 
or maybe even a thumb. the car is 
an extension of the body's sadness.
wants to drive us into the scortched earth.
if lightning strikes a car while you're inside
you need to wait to be let out. i learned that
in high school. i pray my car will be struck 
by lightning & i hear the voice of god say
no you can't pray for that. we will 
get home somehow. i have a jam jar 
that i coax you into. shut the lid.
roll to towards the apartment. the apartment
is invisibly on fire. is secretly 
a supermarket. is just 
over the next hill. is in walking distance
from all this awful. i ask the sun
if it would consider a brief life
as a wheel. the day fizzles out 
& i ask the moon who is always game
for transformation. only a crescent.
a bumpy ride. the car limps across
highway after highway. i ask you
where you want to go & then i remember
i jarred you up & sent you away.
miles later i discover your jar.
i open it to find a violet
spool of yard. i wrap myself up in you.
tangled. a mess. all the spiders 
sense a struggle. where are you 
taking me? the spare tire snake
skirts into the sky where there was
once the moon.

i keep telling myself it is strawberry season somewhere

you have to forgive me 
for how naive i can be with my dreaming.
it is in fact not strawberry season somewhere
& seasons were invented by farmers who were
fearful of the dirt. they went outside 
& prayed to green leaves like skirts.
i am lonely & thinking of strawberries in their fields-- 
in their nests. i'm thinking of strawberries 
ready to hatch & shrouded by two or three broad leaves.
the crow lingers just above the field
full of red warm hunger. want to eat strawberries
but the farmer has set out glinting stripes of foil 
to scare the crow away. 
somewhere, yes, forgive me again, somewhere
the strawberries are swelling to size 
of faces. there is a strawberry 
the size of my skull or no maybe
my skull has always been a ghost-white berry 
waiting to ripen. redness is not always an indication
of taste. i am eating bitter strawberries tonight
& they tricked me with their strong sense of red.
i ask the strawberries where they came from
& their shake their heads on the paper plate 
i pluck them from. sour. each sour.
they prickle on my tongue but i eat them anyway.
they traveled all the way here to be devoured
& i will not deprive them of that. also 
there might be no strawberries tomorrow
& we might all start talking about 
our memories of strawberries. i will need
their bitter feet in my throat to tell strangers
how recently i consumed them. 
i will say something about how fleating 
every fruit is. all my strawberries
could sprout wings tonight too & just make off.
maybe yes maybe when this is all over
i will build a green house 
under the earth. i will hire angels
for sun light. dear god, how do you listen to me?
dreaming of nothing but strawberries.
i will wade into the side & sit 
in my greenhouse to witness my rows & rows
of endless strawberries in their endless seasons.
isn't that always the case. we turn towards
imagining our way around nature. 
yes, this is what i want. a living room
of strawberries. a hall 
of strawberries. an afterlife.

on intrusion

is there someone you can call 
to talk to you about the presense of electric orbs
hovering in your house? really, it is your fault
for leaving all the windows open 
& talking to yourself. everything can become
an act of summoning if you are not careful.
this is why we should keep our wanting quiet--why we
do not tell others the wishes we make
over blown out candles & beheaded dandelions.
i am not a good person to consult
on unwanted visitors seeing as i have been one.
you must have said something then--you must have 
suggested you were lonely or that you wanted
to seethe with power. these kind of things
don't happen to normal people.
have you ever had an angel visit 
to tell you about the circumstances 
of your own death? you have to understand,
angels are very mischevious & bored. one stood
on my coffee table with all of its sixteen eyes
& told me i would die the next day. when i lived
i took back all my prayers to angels 
& redirected them to pigeons who are
far more holy. if the orb speaks, as it likely will,
resist the urge to write down everything it says.
let the words wash over you. it might tell you
the deepest truths about you or it might tell you 
spools of lies. it is also possible 
the lies & the truths will overlap. 
what i am trying to say is, you need to 
handle this one on your own. i have
a lot going on. my windows are always open
thus i have a lot of visitors. they are talking now
& i should be a better host. what you need to do
is hide your journal. you have no journal?
well then hide your lost teeth,
the ones you used to save is a cleaned out 
black-berry jam jar. just trust me
it will be better this way. we wouldn't want
an electric orb to also have teeth.
that scares even me. you should just accept now
that it might never leave even if you try.
you could invest in a tarp to drape over it
or you could give in & stare deeply into 
its radiance until you feel your face go static 
& you too become a window intruder. the latter
is what i did. there are still moments 
on the right evening where i feel myself drawn 
to becoming an orb of energy. i wake up
dazed & laying face up in parking lots.
i spit dryer lint from my mouth. so thirsty, i rush home
to take a cool shower where i cry huge 
furnature-sized tears. i apologize. i have said
more than you wanted. what you really need to do 
is rush it the orb. you will know
what to do when you stand for hour. take note
of the way it casts shadows on your living room floor.
observe your life reflected in its tangled face.
call me then & tell me what you saw. 

i've been having conversations with ambulances.

always hurried. never complete.
i told one tonight, i want to know
what it will take to make be feel whole.
i thought of the two words whole 
& hole. i took a pair of scissors
to slice a small hole in the side of a building.
i spy inside. i see a family of 
mice around a tiny table. they are sharing
a poptart & a discarded chicken bone.
ambulances are not for them. i imagine
a tiny ambulance that might carry them.
a higher pitched wailing. 
night is a sheet of construction paper
in a pile of blue. i don't find any benches
i can sit on. everything is dangerous these days
even the moon who runs with scissors.
i am careful with everything sharp, even sounds.
sometimes my speaking severs trees i pass
right down the middle. great firewood 
if i happened to have a fireplace.
there are no convenient places to burn lately.
every rooftop hides away from climbing
& the ambulances are out there screaming
all the red out of a day. there is only
so much color for any particular moment.
i try to talk to them. i try desperately.
i choose impossible company. when it's not ambulances
it's dead poets. i open their books
to random pages & try to conjure them
in full body aparitions. i'll take nothing less.
an ambulance told me just a few hours ago 
in their rushed & babbling way 
i want to eat a pile of spaghetti i want
to hold a fridge. you should never spend too long
waiting for anything. 
an argument against patience. i wanted to ask
what he meant or if there was a moment
that drew him to this conclusion.
i wait & wait & wait. i wait 
for sweet potatoes to roast. i wait 
for night to wrap me up with indigo.
i cook a box of spaghetti in case the ambulance
wants to talk again. we could sit at the table
& talk slower. i did not plug
the hole i left in the side of the building
where the mouse family eat a late dinner.
anything can become a diarama. 
i return to my own model home. all the trinkets.
my room with no window. the sound
of another ambulance shouting
i am running alone tonight. 

i spilled nail polish 

& it dripped right through the year 
into the next where it lingered 
as a burgundy ghost standing on the carpet.
my life has been full of smudges 
& stains. grease making a dress 
translucent. oil always spatters
in the shapes of new continents.
there is a bowl of finger paint
lingering in the living room. i dip my fingers
to leave my prints all over my parent's couch.
there are many ways to be memorable
& one is letting yourself blotch any scene.
i used to wish i had a birthmark
& i would search my skin for one
until i decided i would just make my own 
with a bowl of ketchup & a hot spoon.
the nail polish drips until it forms 
a waterfall of color & little silver beads.
teal & black & pink & gold. 
not only people with uteruses will wake up
in schemes of their own blood.
it is only a matter of time before 
you start imprinting color. my blood 
is blue on some cold nights when 
i read poetry at my desk & dream 
of great stretches of water. 
water is terrible at undying. 
sure it is persistent but where is
the bruising? the fingerprint?
i had my fingerprints done once
at a small police station in pennsylvania.
i stood & let a uniformed man 
dip my fingers in ink & press them 
at all different angles. the nail polish ghosts 
stood watching & nodding. 
they were hoping the ink would be
a more vibrant color & all the way home
in my car they spilled & spilled some more.
i see them always in my vision now
as different stains. grass is very good 
at leaving your knees green. 
i crawled on all fours too much.
the best traces are the ones 
only you know about. in my apartment now
there is a tiny speck of red paint
fallen from my mouth & onto the carpet. 
i moved my bed over top of it so no one will see.
sometimes when i'm alone i check on it 
& it glares like a single eye.