suffragettes will you put jonquils in my hair? let's planting tulip bulbs in the asphalt-- we'd make the streets rising like bread on the counter you make me feel like a suffragette-- like the woman-sun as she cuts her hair into a bob & drops locks into the lavender rivers of our blood we would make terrifying girls-- what could we do with the vote? steal it-- ballots in our teeth sprinting away into the night clutching the hems of our long-sleeved dresses-- will you pluck off my buttons like blackberries? take scissors to my sleeves-- let's make sashes & banners that say We will have what we want-- undress for me in the quiet space at the neck of the crocus-- this is where we will be happy & alone no i'm not a girl at least not anymore but if i were alive in the 1920s i would have been-- maybe i would have even liked it-- when i was a little girl i rubbed dirt into my knees-- i would pull weeds from the cracks in the sidewalk & treat them like sisters-- setting them in glasses of water on the kitchen table-- cut my hair into a bob-- we'll put on our beautiful sunday hats-- rims keep the church bells from clattering out of the sky-- does heaven believe in jonquils? is the sun yellow for us then? i want to be suffragettes because i feel like it would be wild-- it's not that i think it would be easy-- just that it seems straight forward-- to believe that my voice is lodged in a vote-- waiting to be spat into the smiling man's face-- his cheeks bleeding roses-- we would meet up after the great march on a street corner-- you'd light my cigarette & we would whisper revolutions small enough to sleep in flower beds-- you would tell me that i remind you of a crocus-- the first ones in the spring-- the ones that come up without warning in the front yard of the church on Chestnut street i'd kiss you & you'd make me promise never to tell-- i'll spend my first vote on you-- to have us made into locks of the sun's hair-- feather-falling in the street--
03/14
graffiti & the garden of eden does god set timers on his iphone? one to bring the sun up & one to remind the moon to feel ashamed of her white naked body-- does he have one for how long the earth is supposed to last or is he winging it? would he notice if we went back to the garden-- in canvas shoes & shaved heads-- i imagine him sitting on the brown recliner as he watches the messiah doing dishes by dull kitchen light-- mary with her feet up on the blue ottoman-- the garden of eden perching silent in the backyard-- tall sunflower & ivy-- would you like to come with me? no-- i don't want to be the first woman or the first man i've just always wanted to make mischief against paradise-- when my mother first told me about adam & eve & all that sin she was shocked about how fervently i defended the snake-- i crouched by rivers-- flicking my tongue in the hopes of summoning him-- apples in his mouth-- twisting stems-- the ground rotting with fallen pears-- overgrown fence-- let's be naked in the tall grass-- cans of spray paint clinking in my backpack & i'm thinking about the railroad bridge that hangs over I-76 on the way into Philadelphia the language of fat pink & white letters-- the graffiti artist dangling in the night to write their other names-- does he float? does he hang upside down on borrowed spider threads? i'm thinking of the steel beam that says "i was innocent once" that one always makes me want to stop me car in the middle of the high way so that i can try to reply-- i want to find that tree-- the one we all sinned for-- i want to write on the trunk-- just in black-- nothing intricate-- something gritty about knowledge is it vandalism if it was once our body too? paint the vines red with me-- i'll get naked & we can be brick walls-- necks of buildings-- fat thighs of a freight train-- i want you to write on me with anonymity-- eat apples off the ground--
03/13
choir practice you used to sing in saint mary's choir this was vocation-- opening your voice like a pocket watch-- like a tulip bulb-- it was march & i was fifth grade fat as a knotted tree trunk-- & the back seat of your blue jostled as we drove up past the air port dinner-- at night you would sit in the sun room tape recorder praying-- the choir director had recorded herself because you didn't read music-- mass happening upstairs as i sat in the dim living room-- i made communion of oreo cookies & apple cider & sometimes a metal bowl of grapes-- your foot tapping made the pulse of our house-- your guitar ached as it leaned on the book shelf-- i think i believed in god back then & maybe so did you-- back when billy & i sat in the gathering area after school while you went to choir practice-- we watched you through the glass windows into the church-- dusky golden glow of light behind the altar-- the rest of the church dull & shadow heavy-- monsters belly-crawling beneath pews-- sometimes we went outside & sat near the garden-- the one you had planted the year before with lambs ear & daffodils & the pinkish butterfly bush humming mouth full of bumble bees-- the grass turned indigo as we swallowed the sun like a eucharist host-- knees stained green we could hear every one of your ghost hymns as they emptied from stained glass windows-- i imagine the skull of god is something like those windows-- kaleidoscope & cavernous-- reverberating vaguely of your voice oh father forgive me-- i pinched the butterflies by the wings to hold them still-- took handfuls of mulch to feel the dirt beneath my finger nails-- but always paused when you sang the canticle of the turning it has always been my favorite song from church-- it's the only one i can sing now from memory
03/12
grapefruit you said your mother made you eat grapefruit for breakfast purple-pink flesh-- torn out with the spoon dip in sugar when no one was looking-- juice down your arms-- this is our first lesson in how a body should be bitter-- should sting as it comes into being-- when i was little sometimes i would swipe lemons from the fridge-- cut them in half & dip them in the sugar bowl-- like crystals off your puckering body-- & my skull was a grapefruit to be sliced in half-- tart & resentful on your tongue-- i miss the breakfast bar in the living room-- the swivel chairs-- the dead light bulbs-- i miss you in spoonfuls lately-- leaf of basil forkful of fresh salsa-- you're chopped-- onions & tomatoes-- fierce cilantro what is to be done with the over protective skin of grapefruit? worn as an overcoat when i leave mine in the cubby at elementary school-- i learned early from you that womanhood is so much like grapefruit-- like grandmothers in the sink-- cutting hair-- round heads-- round cirtus swallowed whole-- lemons swallowed whole-- the chairs swallowed whole the violets on the sink swallowed whole biting corridors of a body-- you said your mother liked grapefruit-- sometimes eating it pre-cut in fruit cups-- & on her windowsill she had an antique brass scale with fake grapes & pears to balance the sides-- each time i would walk over while no one was looking to squeeze the plastic orbs-- as if one time i would arrive & find them plump & full of juice-- i don't like grapefruit what's left of my girlhood in laid out on scales-- is maybe in your throat-- is maybe bitter & bruised pink-- i sometimes sleep in the rinds-- comforted by the smell of metal knives & dead light bulbs-- mother, let's eat something sweet the lemon has two halves-- climb in the sugar bowl with me let's be women
03/11
daylight savings let's catch the hour as it leaves us-- i'm standing on the porch with my green minnow net as a stream pours down from the moon like egg yolk-- it's 2 am & there's muffled voices of angels as they take dead-of-night strolls in human clothes-- their cold shoe-laced barefeet-- where are you then? are you in bed letting the time do what it will to us? i remember when we used to have to set our clocks-- red digital blare on the end table by my bed-- taking away the hour before it formally left i want to fall back with you but it is march & a time for taking away-- my father will wake up at 2:30 instead of 3:30 i wish that he slept more-- i wish that i slept less as i laid awake minnow-hearted i decided i would go outside-- i wanted to know if the hour left like a comet or a tennis ball-- i'm going to catch it for us & when i do it will thrash in the net like a crayfish-- white claws bared-- flashing in moon-- where should i keep it? the top drawer of my desk? the empty strawberry jam jar on the kitchen counter? i'm going to spend it on you-- i might not even tell you when i do-- it'll be one of those nights where we don't have enough time & i'm supposed to drive home because i'm scared of how long it will take to escape the city i'll reach into my backpack & let the hour free-- kissing the arms of your clock-- the walls of your apartment & you will move towards me like a river cracked open from the forehead of the moon-- hold me-- i want to exist in the hours no longer with us-- this is our folklore-- our kerosene lamp-- or i could save it longer-- keep the hour a secret & peak at it on nights like this where i don't believe that you love me anymore-- smile at it's silver body-- it's fish-eyes & sunset scales-- i feel wrong so i let it go-- but for a second i felt an hour throbbing in my fingers-- i felt all the red numbers on my old alarm clock-- my hands on the back of your neck my father sleeping one hour more
03/10
counting when i was 7 or 8 we would get stopped at the train station in Lions & you would say let's count the cars jostling-- hand-clapping bodies over tracks-- becoming film reel-- flickering light between the skeletons of each train car-- locomotion across our own vertebrae-- did you feel the horn blare from somehow buried in your throat like i did? stacks of maroon rusted beams-- wanderlust blue & mustard yellow box cars 1-2-3- i would try to keep count as they rushed by-- & i would always get distracted imagining myself running beside a car with an open door-- back pack over my shoulder-- gravel grinning under my canvas shoes-- the vagabond in me running-- out of breath until i leap grabbing a sliding door-- landing inside where the slats of the car breath with a rush of missed destinations-- where do the trains go after they pass through Lions station? through Fleetwood then right? where we used to have a house on Franklin street-- where there used to a the farm with the camel & the alpaca-- whose street light was plucked loose from her forehead like a crown jewel-- today we had to avoid main street as trucks dug into her asphalt pelvis-- i felt her double-yellow lines aching through me-- but where does the train go after there? does it follow me back home? invisible-- no--are trains too large to become ghosts? counting, you would mouth the passage of each car-- 25-26-27 how long is it? i would ask before you were done-- & yesterday as we waited for the train at Lion station i didn't remember to count until the blinking red light guard rails started to raise-- arms above our heads-- a kind of white & red praise-- i wanted to ask you if you had counted-- from the length i want to guess the train might have been 30 or so cars long-- the basilisk-- tongue tasting the air as March drinks handfuls of melted snow from the creeks-- as the cows pay no attention to our car coming down noble street-- their stole their eyes from stop lights-- un-blinking & godlike-- by i am still in the box car-- & you are still driving home with an empty passenger seat-- will you tell them your daughter ran away? that she used to count the trains as they passed by?
03/09
gulliver i want to build you a tiny house-- one small enough to fit in the top drawer of your desk-- i crouch on my speckled carpet: desk lamp sun-- nanoscale hammers & nails my fingers are too big for this-- i feel gigantic & i think about my brother who read gulliver's travels he was most afraid of the land of giants as opposed to the land of small people-- i feel like a small person & a giant at the same time-- 6 inches tall with my head breaking through the shingles of the roof-- glass in my hair-- tooth pick femurs-- you wished you had started planning your tiny house earlier-- you wanted to build one on your own but you didn't say where-- i pictured it like one of those HGTV shows a wild backyard-- grass ocean-rippling-- mountains framing the skyline with jagged god-teeth-- do you want to build yourself smaller? do you want to crouch on your hands & knees enough times so that you stand 6 inches tall? i'm making the doorway now-- i measure my open mouth as a template-- i want to be a house some days-- small & with one back window above the kitchen sink-- i want a mantle to take off memories on photographs from underneath my tongue-- prayer cards from funerals-- i'll leave the bed room only big enough to hold me-- walls of my wingspan-- loneliness is big & small-- tell me-- did gulliver envy them? with their rare bodies? & i wanted to know if you intended on keeping company-- i can fit in the smallest of closets-- i can be the miniature on your end table-- or you can keep me on the top shelf of your medicine cabinet-- i mean the one inside the tiny house-- right now you live too far away-- more than a wing span-- when you open your desk & find me i will fit in the palm of your hand-- pick me up gently-- this is an invitation to be smaller-- this is me with the leftover bolts & screws-- they'll never find people here-- microscopic us-- our heads of pins-- our tomatoes plants on the porch the size of aphids when you kiss me it will be so quiet that only we can hear--
03/08
my father's favorite president is theodore roosevelt theodore roosevelt is pacing the floor of the attic-- always my father's favorite president with his caterpillar mustache & his spectacles perched on his nose-- i often mistake him for a grandfather-- trapped up there in the same room as my own granfather's urn of ashes-- most nights he sits in the dark-- patient-- gazing out the screened windows at the alien glow of a small rural town-- counting automobiles as they wing beat down noble street-- check his pocket watch-- my father told me stories about him as if he were a god-- breaking big business with a pick axe-- out of breath as he swung-- ruptured cement & concrete-- i imagined him standing at the desk in the oval office like how i stand at mine when i'm too alive to sit-- he checks his pocket watch that has been dead for decades-- sets its carcass on a book shelf & pages haphazardly through one of my childhood picture books-- the hungry caterpillar-- he scowls with the eyebrows he left in portraits-- i know he's up there but i'm always too shy to go visit him-- what with his stern face & his pointy shoulders-- i would tell him that when i was younger i believed he was the last good president-- i wrote book reports on him & always included the story about his daughter bringing a horse into the white house-- i told my own father that we could therefore fit a horse in our own little 19th century farm house-- even now when i've moved away from my parent's house i can still hear his astray foot steps as he ponders what brought him there-- what forces bound him to the attic with the green carpet & the half-built lego star wars sets on the shelf-- we all have promised now to give him any newspapers-- keep him pristine & unknowing sometimes i do leave my poetry up there though in the hopes that the 26th president might find something of himself in it-- i wonder if as he stares out the back window if he imagines the landscape of yellowstone or cliffs in colorado-- will he one day cut holes in our walls like he did to panama? day dream floating on his back beside canal boats in south america-- for now he's just perched on the side of what used to be Billy's thomas train table-- pocket knife whittling away a number 2 pencil-- his face stone-hovering on the black hills of south dakota
03/07
weatherman when will you become snow? i felt the rain getting lighter each drop deploying parachutes-- disembodied wings of geese-- whose winter are you flying towards? wet against my red jacket under a grey night sky-- stars burning under the oily face of the moon-- was that you underneath my blankets? hot & headlight melting-- traffic singeing our bodies-- i stood in the supermarket parking lot last night as i texted you that i'd gotten home safe-- i think you were already asleep-- the world smelled metallic-- like ice & screw drivers they're calling for 4-10 inches i feel it up to my neck-- i feel like i won't know if i really love you till i say it a loud & i wish i was brave enough to be trapped inside-- tell me-- did you look out your window to check the progress of the rain? did you feel yourself getting lighter? getting ready to fall-- red balloons & stop lights in your lips-- i wish you would fall into me-- a handful of bolts & bottle caps-- a downpour of mouths-- your teeth grazing sidewalk-- each ivory sky scraper-- puncture the moon-- bleed asphalt & rock salt-- i keep a pair of scissors in my back pack to shatter the walls of snow globes-- & earlier today when i talked to my father on the phone he said that he wished he was a weatherman so that he never needed to be right-- i want to be a weatherman too-- stand with me tonight in front of the green screen-- let's predict a cold front-- let's stand in the lawn & measure the snow fall with a yard stick-- do you remember that year it snowed in october? or that year we had off from school for nearly a week? no? sometimes i forget you didn't grow up beside me-- i imagine us small-- snow to our waists-- i kiss you & we turn into snow flakes-- i miss that excitement that the world could end-- even if only for a few hours-- when i got up this morning i opened the window to listen to the clouds rip out their children's feathers leave tinsel in the nest-- you said you're allergic to down-- the kind used to stuff pillows-- my mother was too-- for you i'm rejecting the metaphor of snow & feathers-- this snow is glass-- chandeliers snapping their necks-- i wanted to ask you if i could be your weatherman-- if you could trust me to read your precipitation-- foot prints in your body-- thumb melting through your collar bone-- i'll guess that someday we could be a terrible storm the kind of storm children pray to i feel you getting lighter-- dying in street lamps & driveway-- your body just like every other snowflake i've ever loved into water-- where are we going to put all snow?
03/06
one hand your mother was scared of sink holes she read aloud the headlines about a home in florida where a sink hole swallowed a little boy-- eight years old he reached his hand out from the mouth of a sea monster-- fingers turning red as he was chewed-- floor board teeth-- grit gravel tongue-- he died & there's another sink hole forming in your grandparent's backyard-- i never got to see it for myself but i imagined a whirlpool a bath tube drain emptying our bodies of bone-- i don't think much about sink holes but when i loved you i worried you would get devoured by one-- in your back yard soft from april rain-- barefoot i saw your ankles sinking-- twisting-- the ground planted with shark jaws i tried to think of what i would do if you ended up like that boy-- hand holding onto a piece of sky-- i would probably walk away out fear-- maybe i would find a thrust of courage-- entangling my fingers with yours-- tugging your arms loose from its socket-- i think my greatest fears were realized when i kneeled in front of you & realized there was nothing i could do to make myself love you again your skin reminded me of sand in winter-- of firework ashes-- now sometimes when i take walks i think see sink holes opening in the middle of the trail-- i see the last glimpse of that boy as he tries to understand what could be happening-- did he even know the earth could do that to us? contort-- pucker-- consume us at will-- did he pray? open his mouth to shout to his mother? i know that it's selfish but i hope if you're eaten by the soil beneath you that maybe you'll think to call out to me-- maybe you won't know why or what that means-- i would come-- i'm older now i would know not to try & yank you free-- i would take your hand & push it deeper-- this is to say that i would expect you do the same for me-- if in your own throat you feel my name swallow hard--
