i want to keep my dust

cultivate book shelf foreheads
a whole house 
just for dust
the door with hinges on both sides
no knob
there's no room for anyone else
in my dust
just fingers drawings 
tally marks
count days in the dust
count weeks in the dust 
count hours in the dust
watch the dust grow like
a pond of flurries
the muck 
the green
count flecks of skin
count flecks of planets,
there's Mars in the dust
sometimes Saturn 
often dead stars
dip in to taste a pinkie-full
no dryer lint 
but the smell of hair
whose hair?
i'm not letting anyone see this
these are my textures 
to caress    
cull for sounds
this is what i will use
my family's old house for
when they've all given
themselves to dust
falling onto the kitchen floor
as dust shadows
the outline of a body in dust
never clean 
any of this up
i want the dust to grow
so loud 
scoop up in hands 
wild throwing back into the air
inhale the dust
live inside one lung 
with dust for a carpet
exquisite dust
delicious dust 
holy dust 
a pouch of dust
where the old skin 
tries to make an old body
dust is rouge
wants to have legs
wants to taste like soft pretzels
no one else can come here
there's just no room 
i'm here to calm the dust
tells tall tales
until all my dust
lays down 
so i can leave
barefoot prints 

i'll prey for you

touching smooth slime skins
touching yellow red orange
we lived in great water
like salamanders
inflatable bodies 
fuse on the neck 
where all the air 
comes out
i brought the smaller animals 
to the rocks
rats bats chewing gum mammals
taught them to sit still
before we're ready 
for mass
only Catholics say mass 
i'll prey for you
i'll stay for you 
on the water peering
out at the world 
like a hippopotamus
how many syllables
in that word? 
i want my name to have
that girth
shake earth 
shake food chains 
like maracas or
rain sticks
all the edible animals 
that means all the animals 
how do you eat 
an elephant 
one mouse at a time
we float 
i love the hands 
of salamanders
they remind me of
my brother's baby fingers 
curled around my pinky
edible brother 
soft like pink chewing gum 
stick him to 
the bottom of the table
we forgot about
the water
the wading the shark
not sharks
the one big shark 
moving beneath it all
that one is god or maybe
just a priest
see the fin in the distance
say i won't prey 
i won't prey 
not me
sometimes send him 
another direction 
red orange yellow  
all in the pool together
i ask my brother if he remembers
when we ate him
he shakes 
his head

hydrangea  

he puts his nose to my ear
smells the April in me,
the May making purple
pink blue 
i tell him that he's
caught me
get the trow
distrust the science
of brains
my family grown hydrangeas
in our skulls
we eat dirt for the roots
drink water but never too much 
drowned so many 
good flowers that way
water gushing from 
noses water making
mush soil 
count the petals
all afternoon 
assigned female at birth 
assigned fragrance at birth
assigned floral at birth 
we knew grandmom 
was gone when she started
smelling like wet leaves 
blue roots crawling under 
her hands 
i see mine there too
only they're not
as angry yet
he's not the first 
boy to notice
doesn't ask 
just stares 
into my open mouth
admires the garden 
plans a bench behind
my eyes so he can
watch my life unfold
stained glass iris 
he doesn't like
girls which is good 
because i'm not a girl 
which is good because
his trow is covered
in dirt
which is good because
i want him 
to dig
i lower my head like
i'm going to be 
blessed or knighted
my mother told me
that my great great
grandmother planted 
the first hydrangea
i curse her softly
why me
he smells like hot rain
scoops the earth
he loves it
i say 
deeper 
he says 
petals
i say 
ignore them 
he says 
how could i?

Gender 

avocados change their 
sex every day:
female by day 
male by night.
more avocado trees.
plant them in my hair 
plant them in sidewalk cracks
and the gaps in my teeth.
i want so many avocado trees
to duck under, the fruit
swelling like fat green tears drops,
plopping down on my body,
leaving bruises in the shape
of perfect circles,
polka-dots or bulls-eyes
or third eyes.
i'll tell them it's okay,
that there are humans 
who experience the same 
gender tumbling.
i peel a fruit
put the pit in my mouth 
to suck on 
it's sensual,
big round heavy seed
spit in the dirt.
i'll show the trees my nail polish
i'll show the trees the scars 
where my breasts used to be 
they will understand then
what sex means, 
the pollen all night 
all night
shouting pollen at 
the earth, how dare the pollen 
so yellow 
sticky on my hands.
oh avocado trees 
make a female of me by day 
so that i can make 
fruit like yours,
blooming from my hair 
pump ripe green,
i pluck them to fill
a bowl on the counter
my avocado, 
finger nails 
dig into the tough skin 
soft innards,
muted color texture
god of avocados 
save the pits

the global quieting 

will you help me
re-teach the earth  
how to make sound? 
we watched
it escape through a hole 
in the ozone (like a hole
in a pocket) taking all the noise:
a drain, 
the slow balloon leak, 
bird's voices got
quieter  quieter each day. 
as a child 
you / i would
sit beneath the big pine trees,
straining to hear 
cardinals above,
you signed to me 
"i can hear one, 
i can hear one"
i didn't believe you
but i told you to repeat
the sound back, even your
voice muffled by the thickness 
of the air, your mouth 
open: a beak, reenacting
the sound of the red bird.
for a moment i heard you
i believed in sound again.
i want you to do that for
every clamor / babel
i want to walk you through
the creek so you can speak
to the water. i'll invent
a sound for the wind,
air through my lips, a rush,
high pitched, what 
does high pitched look like?
like bright bleach sun?
like UV protection cream?
of everyone i thought 
you might remember
these things, you 
who had listened so closely
before the sound left,
i half-believe that 
all the noise exists 
in your body, that if 
you bloomed open you would
music box sing. 
if you come back i will
show you, i have practiced
the rain, your favorite,
i make it by flicking
with my tongue 
against the back of 
my teeth. i imagine
you kissing me while 
i do, your mouth 
filling with rain.

Flower Alphabet 

i press my ear 
to the ground to listen 
for landmines; 
voices: orchestra 
& maroon.
there are land mines so 
old that their makers
are in the ground there
with them. 
talking to 
the bodies, 
the explosives mutter
something about steam,
something about iron.
something about
wanting the burst
to be over, the dream
they have each night
of wrong steps, a small
rabbit's foot pressed 
into violin air. 
all the while the dirt
recites the names 
of flowers in 
alphabetical order
starting with 
Aconitum. will
i end up a land mine
or a body? i can't
know that yet
but i can practice.
i dig holes in 
the yard & crawl 
inside, taking 
all the speech 
in. i too learn
the order of the flowers,
i whisper 
African Daisy
Agapanthus
Alchemilla
in hopes that 
i will bypass
becoming a corpse 
or carcass of waiting,
underneath 
the soil i ask
the land mines if
they know how to 
disarm themselves 
& they scream, tongues
as cymbals, smashing
the words of brass
& clarinet, language
as needles in the soil,
the bodies speaking too now, 
pleading for the mines 
to go off already 
& bring more
bodies down to where
the roots clutch 
at us with thin
soft hands. i shake
myself out 
of the earth, spitting
gravel & grasping 
handfuls of grass. 
have they all forgetten
about grass down there?
the loud & watermelon smell
of green. i breathe 
it in & listen 
ear to ground again.
i can't help it,
it can't help it.
i say, 
Aconitum:
common name: monkshood

a love poem 

i want to be 
catfished.

make a person 
for me.
i want 
to bask in the sensation 
of love 
without touch.

give me 
several stock photos

standing on a porch:
dark brown hair, olive skin,
soft malleable features,

a clay body for me
to dig 
my finger nails into.

i want him to 
be a postman, calling me
on his delivery route.
prone to paper cuts,
he wears six band-aides 
on his left hand,
i know this because

i believe him through
the phone call;
his voice so strong
that his body materializes,
for a moment,
in the middle of the room. 

hologram romance.

i'll count the miles between us:
233
writing the number
on every wall in my house.

i want to be catfished
& i want to know 
it's happening, to be
in control of my own

uncontrollable 
& destructive 
& inevitable
desires,   

stripping down to just my skin
& walking in every direction
those 233 miles
until i come to a stream.

"this is his house"
i'll tell myself

thrusting my full
arm under the water
for a real catfish to bite.

forgetting his name, 
i'll give him a new one, 
calling aloud 
six times:
John    George
Paul    Isaac
Matthew Robert 
all of them are now 
his names,

i lug the scales-&-water-catfish 
to a nearby rock, 
pry the creature's
mouth from my arm 
& let it go: 

thrash 
in the creek.

i want to be 
catfished.

opportunity

my battery is low &
it is getting dark

who did the mars rover imagine
in his last moments crossing 

the scabbed ground? the god 
of war lived round & copper 

beneath him. we should pray 
him into heaven like we do

each year for my aunt joan.
15 years ago when he first landed

she was still alive & dyed
her hair the same color as his rocks.

his sphere-attic world
laughing under his feet, she held

the counter to make her way
through the kitchen. i see

myself at 15 walking mars:
a girl in a purple halter dress 

& blue hair, perched
on a precipice looking over 

the relics of a martian sea. 
she draws starfish in the pie-crust

ground before the darkness 
encroaches on all sides. taste

of dying sits in the back of her throat
like chewing aluminum foil.

what angels does she meet?
what other gods did our mars rover know?

building shrines in his machinery,
a solitary worship, his altar of red giants, 

each a candle lit by the bold &
stubborn death of a star. he sings

to himself like i do, like 
my aunt joan did, even as she was dying,

her voice leaving her body
as a ribbon into the ceiling fan,

even farther above the rover hummed.
did he pretend that he had parents?

a normal life? high school years?
a first love far far below?

the 15 year old me up there buckles
& falls like the trunk of a tree.

my aunt took years. her gaze always
drifting farther & farther above our

heads as she forgot us more each day.
did she know the rover somehow?

did they talk? did she tell them
her life stories as they left her.

i know he listened, kept those stories, 
repeated the details to himself for comfort:

a green wave on the jersey beach, 
two white shell-shaped clip-on earrings.

the rover's eyes go dark slowly, 
the thinning of throat, he hears 

the transmission commanders as they call
for him, all his fathers, 

hears Billie Holiday singing 
"I'll be seeing you

In all the old familiar places,"
thinks of everyone else who 

died too young & says to himself 
"what good company i am in."

how tall is

i walk on dark stilts 
in the parking lot, back & forth 
what kind of bird?
my guillotine shadows saunter  
removing the heads of plastic bag ghosts,
slicing parking spaces 
like pound cake. 

the top shelf is not 
all that far away now & 
then i won't have to ask you 
to stretch your talons up
to pull another bird's nest down
by the neck 

each day i add another foot
to my new legs, teach 
myself how to stumble
taller & taller, as high as
the water tower, mouth full
of mouth: 
a water balloon tongue

when the cars scream their horns 
i shout back, dead cranes
calling out with both of 
our beaks, we have
a conversation about 
the sadness of driving 
in new york with the rain spitting
to remind us how unclean 
we still feel

you wouldn't recognize me
so elevation.
head bumped on the hot-faced moon,
is this how tall is a man?

i slow dance the lamps 
in the parking lot, call
them sweet names like "dearest"
& "doll"
each almost as tall
as me

a waltz sound crawls 
on all fours from the grates
so i sway alone, circling 
the carcass of my car 
like a condor, soft
green meat of 
a passenger seat 

i call out again 
to no horn in particular,
it's loon & lonely
out here

add another foot,
steady myself 

at least 
i'm tall now

after 3 days i give up on sleep & give in to everything else

an 8 is a 3 with it's
mouth all closed & i laid
awake thinking of how it feels
to put your thumb on the not-sharp
side of the knife.
i peel myself up, some kind
of rind fruit, my stuff 
all orange & sweet 
cantaloupe or tangerine:
with necks like puckered eyes.
somewhere my mom was snoring
& my dad compared the noise
to a chain saw. it cut holes
in the drywall. 
it gnawed a silhouette 
of everyone, haunting 
a house by nightlights,
dad & his living ghost.
do i talk in my sleep?
i might & if i do it's 
not me but a string 
of previous selves desperate
for a mouth to make
promises with. 
listen to them & write
them down, this 
is where the knife 
comes in again:
cut the language 
into the bed post 
or the wall. no i don't
have a bedpost. i have 
a twin
sized bed & most days 
its size feels coffin like,
i hope they don't bury 
me with you, there's 
not enough room & 
if i'm going to 
be an 8 i'd like to 
have room for decorations.
a bowl for a cave fish,
still hearing her snores
under the earth
i ask someone if it's
just an earth quake.
no answer just the house
crinkling & reptilian,
metal-scaled & shrugging 
off a playground insult
making its way through 
the pipes.
i ask the house 
if it will dig 
the hole for me, 
not too deep, not six feet
i need to be able to crawl
out if i change my mind.
a gust of wind rattles us.
i put my thumb to the back
of a knife, stand there
by the sink just caressing,
ignoring the other side. 
i open my mouth to talk
with both of my mouths:
one to laugh &
one to ask for silence
& sleep.