black piano key teeth 

tell what you think of me now--
i ask my ten-year-old body.
i meet her at the
front door of the malt shoppe
with her crisp black belt slung 
around her neck & an audacious spoon
in her fist.
i tell her that i've become a mouth of empty 
bowls & a voice of 
vacant swivel stools--
i explain how they're
stuck in my throat as squeaky
hollow apologies
to my body.
she doesn't say much &
holds to door open for me.
she has bare feet that must
feel cold on the checker-board
linoleum floor.
she think it's funny that
i send myself sympathy cards 
full of spoons- we laugh
when i tell her how they clatter on
the kitchen floor when i open the
envelopes
& my OCD seems
so absurd when i'm talking to her--
like motions from a children's record 
telling all the boys & girls to
spin round & round like spiders--
i tell her how i  
lick the sweetness off stamps &
i confess that
i'm so afraid my own teeth
that i want to take them out one
by one--
watch--i say--
as i chew with the sound
of black piano keys.
oh black belt girl if you
could only pull out
my spine like fruit roll-up--
the flick of your wrist that once 
moved the floor boards to
break themselves-- 
peel me out of this body
i want to be stronger-- i want
to believe in something
other than the tally i've been
keeping on my wrists--
i say
i ruined us-- i ruined us--
the malt shoppe is 
just like it had been--
a row of red padded stools &
candy jars in a line like
the canopic jars of a pharoh's
tomb-- only i'm not prepared 
to burry her here--
she asks me where all my hair went
& i tell her one morning
i woke up to the sound of
morning doves on the ledge outside--
opened the window & their
wings sliced it all off--
i explain how i
watched it fall in the front
lawn like the dead branches of 
evergreen trees-- their ghosts playing
tag by the mailbox &
i ask her what she thinks of spoons
& she tells me she thinks of
them like boats. 
sarah scoops
a bite of banana split into her
mouth & we float in the channel
between chingoteague & assateague
in a kayak again-- 
we can see my father
ahead of us & clams click their
jaws like castanets all around--
i ask her where she learned to 
float & where she got her
teeth from & she tells me that
we're both floating & that
they're my teeth too  
& we're back in the malt shoppe.
she wipes syrup drunk strawberry
from her elbow & offers me
a bite of sundae--
i refuse & sip my diet coke--
i imagine the ocean fizzling around
me-- waves of foam & bubbles 
in our stomachs-- i ask her
where we went wrong-- i ask
her how she could ever think she
was me & she doesn't look up
from the banana split-- takes
spoon after spoon of herself--
we float in the peel-- spotty & brown--
i brace the counter & cough up
all the spoons in a clatter
of black piano keys
& the radio plays
"the leader of the pack" again
& the walls are poodle skirt pink
& i ask her what she knows 
about re-learning how to eat--
she picks up a spoon 
that's fallen on the floor-- wipes
it off with the fabric of her
karate uniform & hands it
back to me & we're floating
again & this time the sun is setting
& we both reach up & take spoonfuls
of the sherbet sky--
she laughs & tells me that 
she likes my nose ring &
i tell her that i love 
her neon blue nails--
she tells me that sherbet 
has milk or cream & that 
sorbet is different because 
it doesn't have dairy--
it's just frozen fruit--
so i ask her what the sky tastes 
like-- & she tells me
it's with-out-a-doubt 
sherbet but
that everything she
eats with me always
tastes a little bit
like a sunset or a 
black piano key--
we eat until 
there's no ceiling
left to the sky--
hold the cold spoons
under our tongues &
i tell her i'll send
her post cards & someday
she'll find me floating 
with her in the cupped
palm of one of the thousands 
& thousands of spoons
we could float on.

we put a cupboard in the fireplace
 & filled it with mason jars--
 my mother's pickled beets &
 sandy mustard glowing like 
rusted halos-- boiled blossom
 rows of raspberry & blue berry
 jam-- we kept our summers in
there like a fire burning in december
when our christmas table gets 
smaller & smaller until we all
open up the cupboard & stare into
it like a television of sun--
we remember the smell of fresh sage
& eating berries until we were sick 
& wearing stomachs like steel bowls
of this fruit-- one by one we crawled
inside & closed the doors behind us--
& of course it was my birthday again--
the finger nails of july--
& the cake tasted only of firefly
glow & the inhale of the corn 
thrashing in a gust of wind
from my father's blue jeep as it
races with a railroad tracks--
each bump a calendar square-- we
run away from the seasons around
us-- seal summer in mason
jars for safe keeping--

skin.

i tattooed the clouds
on my skin last night.
every inch was
moving with the insistent
pull of the wind &
i grew my
hair long again
to feel it fall off in
october. it fell in clumps
& gathered
at my feet with the rest 
of the leaves--
blood-red & brown--
& when you touched me 
you felt the sky move
across you-- 
a laugh of static &
storm--
i stood your hairs 
on end like soldiers & you told
me to roll-up the windows--
veil me in fog-- your bride
of backseat love & 
driving to 
park in strip malls to say 
i love you in the kind
of way you can't in a bedroom.
you can kiss my blood
into rain but you can't
take my skin--
it's not something that
can be shared-- & you will call
me selfish for leaving you
only with storm clouds painted
on your shoulders--
i point to my arms & say
here i tilled the rows
of my wrists to write
my self-love in thunder--
my freckles grow into 
watermelon-- 
swallow the black
seeds & grow vines from
your throat--
silly backseat-lover
with a mouth
like a window full of fog--
leave hand prints on 
my collar bones--
i have had match sticks burry
their heads in my forearms--
i light the birthday candles
with my fingernails-- 
this body
has know windows-- 
this body is in  
violent love with itself &
this is what loving a boy
full of clouds is like--
i don't want you to eat the 
fog away with that mouth
of yours-- 
i want you 
to pass the clouds over your
shoulders & feel how heavy 
water can be when it 
becomes a storm-- we're about
to rain-- we're about to rain--
roll up the windows 
the water is getting in.

sadie hawkins & our hair
full of hindenburg fire

she sits on a bench in
the park-- pushing back 
the hem of her cuticles--
& november is a face
laughed full of leaves--
she's catching love with
a thick leash of rope because
sadie hawkins knew that 
that freedom was a mouthful
of white-picket-fence boy--
my first dance 
in high school was
a sadie hawkins dance--
as if a 9th grade girl
could have a say in what
boy she picked to excavate
her body for a night &
every 9th grade girl knows
sadie hawkins-- she yells
at them to call them 
"little sluts" as they pass
her bench in the park--
she was a homily 
woman-- still a "girl" 
at 35 because she was
doomed to be a fisher of men--
she shift for
them like gold--asking
for god to keep her name 
under his tongue--
oh we all knew sadie hawkins--
believed her-- trusted her-- 
learn from her & with our
butterfly nets out we
hunt for red velvet cupcake
love from the bake sale 
in the lobby--
oh how they would eat us--
our soccer goals bellies filling
up with disco balls-- 
he brought
hammers & picks-- a shovel
& a pan to collect my pieces in--
no fourteen year old girl could have 
known yet that boys eat geodes--
use women's own ropes to tie
them to their park benches--
gnaw open with teeth-- our 
bodies crowded each other 
like gymnasiums reverberating 
with light & sinking balloons--
we fell like hindenburgs--
each & every one of us as we
thought about all the times
we had run away from her
when we walked late at night through
the park on sleepovers--
heard her calling
"slut" & "Whore" into the disco ball
moon as if attempting to banish those
words forever from underneath 
her tongue-- when she was done screaming
she would sit still for a few moments--
panting & sweaty from the moist
lips of august-- fail to 
light a cigarette & instead set
flames in her hair & laughing
like a phoenix she told us
to run & never believe anything they
tell us--
in the bathroom mirror 
i stared at my own smudged face
after the dance & never felt so
devoured--
i sat on the toilet & cried--
ankles sore from being perched
in black heels-- this was only
the beginning of what it was like
to have a girl-body--
the art of giving away yourself--
piece by piece so you're 
easier for him to swallow-- 
my body became a gymnasium of
sound-- i lit
the match & held it close to
my hair-- considering how fast
my bleached hair would erupt
in fire-- i blew it out & dropped
the match stick in the sink--
it sizzled softly like a faint
neck kiss-- a brand-- a burn--
& i'm still unlearning 
the doors he opened for
me on ever inch of skin--
this is a prayer to sadie hawkins--
the patron saint of 9th grade girls--
we believe so firmly in you
& they'll tell us
we choose to dance 
these bodies into ash
smudged on the bathroom mirror--

post cards from arizona & jars full of rain

i tipped over the terrarium
& the two toads scampered free
into the hot breath of july rain--
the trail was saturated in twilight
color-- jagged emerald leaves--
each gravel of the trail by
the stream was a freckle
washing away in the dwindling storm--
i told them to write to me &
left my address on a sticky note
on the ground next to them--
i said
tell me where you go
& where this rain takes you--
i watched them crawl into 
the forest-- caressed as
if to pull their mother's long
skirt over their heads--
i cried not because i had let
my two pet toads go but
because when i was little
& freckled 
& emerald green-- 
my father 
& i would catch toads--
i would beg him to keep them 
in the terrarium or the sand pale
on night longer but we eventually let
them go into the yard by
the sun of a porch light--
growing up is something about
release & keeping mason jars full
of rain from all your favorite storms--
at home i keep them in the cupboard
by the fireplace-- open them up
when i want it to rain from the
ceiling even if only briefly--
there are storm clouds collecting beneath
our pillows-- hail falling
from the arms of a ceiling fan--
turn on the sun &
wash the gravel from my hair & my hands--
i sat in the back seat of my car
to twist on the lid to the mason jar full of
rain from the storm
my toads went back to-- i put the
jar in the trunk & now i open
it sometimes when i feel especially lonely--
they return-- the both of them
--hop across the floor of the living
room-- mouths full of crickets--
throats pulsing like trampolines--
on monday i get the first of many post cards--
an image from the petrified forest 
national park where all the trees
are only memories-- a fallen limp
across the from of the card with the national
park logo in the corner--
i find it odd that they decided to travel to
a place with so little rain-- i consider
sending them a mason jar but i suppose
if they had wanted rain they would know
where to find it--
the card doesn't say much--
only that they had stopped at a lovely
mexican eatery on the way down & 
that they hardly ever considered eating
crickets anymore--
i don't write back to them--
just keep the postal cards in the top
drawer of my desk--
i leave their terrarium empty
& somehow haunted 
in the open window of my room--
the rain falls again from the ceiling
fan & i return to the front
seat of the car to drive home--
gravel freckled & green 
from the rain-- 

7th grade mummification

i like to say i
hardly remember 7th
grade-- i know i must have
discovered checker-board vans 
& the thrift store that sold 
fifty-cent fish nets &
neon skinny jeans & olive green
eyeliner that orbited my lids 
like saturn rings--
in 7th grade we were got busy
re-living ancient 
history in a class devoted
to re-building the pyramids 
& erecting edible ziggurats 
from our desks--
pink frosting cake & 
kitkat temples 
for the ceiling tile gods--let's
build ourselves closer to the
sky-- none of us should get taller--
opened the windows & thought
about falling two stories
down to the soccer field below
where all the boys played capture the
flag-- grass stain gladiators 
& we all wanted boyfriends
after we learned about the pharaohs--
at least then we wouldn't die alone--
twelve years or two-thousand-- we were
far too old to die so young--
if nothing else we knew we believed
in the river to the underworld--
the one where they would weigh your heart 
against a feather--
we all knew we were too heavy--
we all know we would watch
our hearts swallowed by the devourer
as thoth-- the scribe
god would stroke the
gator-beast's neck-- there
we lay on the priest's table
in preparation for our inevitable
mummification in eighth period
history class-- i took the night
before to construct a mask of anubis
to conceal my face & i felt
powerful & ancient--
we took turns taking out each other's
organs & filling the canopic jars--
rubbing our bodies in salt to
keep our bodies clean & fresh 
for the afterlife we were too
heavy to reach-- blow away the
feathers with me-- then there'll
be nothing to weight us against--
sing a pyramid song with me
& i wore the anubis mask 
all period & after school until
i walked home
from school across the damp
grass of my backyard
adjacent to the school-- i removed
my ceremonial robes
in my room upstairs & looked
at the face of the once jackal-headed god--
plump freckled face of girl
so willing to attempt flight
out a window-- building pyramids
on her desks & reaching 
for the god who blared from
the white neon lights of each classroom--
we all secretly believed in
the love of isis & Osiris--
even if it was incest-- at
least they had each other
& a sun for a father-- what is there
to remember about 7th grade
if the soles still peeled off
my checker-board vans & the
fish nets were still too tight
to fit over my thighs--  
we small ancient people--
mummifying each other & filling
canopic jars with all the apologies
we'd save for our throats--
weigh my heart against the feather
i swear to you i'm not afraid
of how heavy i have been--

i feel like i don't deserve 

the love poems god writes 
to me-- 
her mountains that
nail a picture frame
around the murky blue 
& deep indigo sky--
her trees that hoist
the clouds on their backs &
shake silk worm nests from their
leg hairs--
my mother points out the
way the farm hills around kutztown
swell & crash in seams of corn &
patch-work soybean-- a tangled
thread cocoon & cursive poetry
tongue--
she is an iambic god--
a structural traditionalist
who unravels open into free verse as
she drops the moon from a yoyo string--
i hang on & get sucked into 
her night catalog of punctuation-- 
outside of kutztown we pass the
abandoned water park-- 
slides filled with ghost children
spilling down on their bellies--
wind-blown hair laughter rattles 
each twisted neck of blue shoots--
i feel empty like the water park sometimes--
like i want god to laugh into my
hair-- wash my freckles in chlorine--
i want to smell fresh & indigo &
stand at the top of the biggest slide
there with no fear of becoming a yoyo string--
come back & write me another poem
god-- & another & another
until the water starts flowing again--
i'm telling you, i'm going to buy 
that water park-- pull the
'for sale' sign out of the ground
& re-paint the
pirate statue by the front gate--
i would spend the first night sleeping
under the roof of one of the 
little pavilions-- laugh at how silly 
it all is-- watch the sunset blush
as she reads the same love story over
again-- the one where god loved
her enough to make her body an
act of poetry-- that's all
of us-- i think to myself
-- that's all of us-- a little
pocket notebook-- a knot 
in a yoyo string suspended
over a town called kutztown with
an un-abandoned water park 
jealous in the distance-- 
hush-- i'm here to fill you
up again--
i'm here to remind you
of all the space you have
left to  be filled & 
tonight the slides are dry &
i am feeling my body as a love
poem-- a husk of corn--
a nail in the side of the
mountain-- 
no i don't deserve the love
poetry god leaves for me--
writes into my body in the language
of freckles & 
sun burn from 
climbing up the ladder
to sit at the top of the tallest
slide in the water park
until the moon rolls off the yoyo
string & night is dark &
full of insect laughter &
the cautious chatter of stars
they give themselves away to me
as punctuation--
marble bags full of periods--
let's end this day in a circle 
or a seam-- a stitch in 
the hips of the hills--
bruised indigo & standing 
as determined as the fading
pirate statute at the gate 
to the water park that is
now another piece of 
this body--

by now

i could have walked anywhere
with the number of
steps i've collected
on morning walks alone-- 
i keep each footfall in a velvet
sack like
marbles -- 
learn to shoot them
with the flick of my thumb--
i ramble a railroad 
into the sidewalk
& at night i hear the engines
wail about the 
towns they've never stopped in--
they've listened 
all the names of towns & strip malls
we've wanted to 
pause in & never will-- there are so 
many diners with stools to spin on--
& gumball machines to wind like 
pocket watches--
by now i could have made
it to the grand central taproom
in fleetwood--
sat outside on the wooden bench
& waited for my mother & my father--
the two of them all full of sidewalks 
& their collection of steps
between each other--
my mother cuts crab cakes
with the side of her fork &
my father eats himself through
a bacon-cheeseburger--
they wipe their hands on
their laps & then pretend to use
napkins & they don't notice my
foot steps falling outside
on the pavement like hail--
this is before i was born 
but by now i could have trekked there
in exchange for all these mornings--
i could have meandered my way through
the hole in the backyard 
all the way to china-- brought
my aunt joan back a fish-tail
necklace & hung it on her tombstone--
i could have rambled on the 
backs of my marbles across 
the atlantic to my brother's 
front door in berlin where he pretends
to live the life of a bishop--
takes charge of a dwindling 
parish of stones-- gives homilies 
to the patient moon & i listen for
them when it's dark again--
his voice a beacon of sound like
the moan of the ceaseless railroads--
by now i could have wandered myself
into any of my tomorrows-- 
here's one where i'm still restless 
on a train to new york city again in
another attempt find god at the 
subway station at staton island--
where i saw our lady years ago--
i lugged the ferry on my back & 
saw myself at the railing-- leaning
too much-- always leaning too much--
too close to falling irrevocably into
the bay
yes i could have been there by
now-- on the swivel chairs at the
kutztown tavern where i turned
ten & ate fistfuls of a bar peanuts
& stout pretzels--
by now i could be hail on the sidewalk
in fleetwood or a congregation of stones
or fish tail necklaces pulled from
the mouth of the earth giving way to china 
but, instead,
i have these walks & these legs
who built themselves into railroad tracks--
i keep them all in a sack of marbles to 
trade for produce at the market up
the street from my house-- take my footsteps
for wild heads of ice berg lettuce &
a thick purple carrot thighs--
by now i could have walked sashes 
around the earth but i have been
here-- walking myself into a girl
into a boy into a sidewalk where leaves
stick like band aids in september & 
where the rain dries quickly
in the sun-- this is where i spent my
legs these years-- by now
by now i can call myself a train station--
a stomping ground for passengers to
board & crawl up on my shoulders
to look out at the little town i live
in by only pass through--
i'm still collecting steps & by
now, by now i have such veins 
that the subways are jealous--
i'm shooting my marbles into
the sea from the deck of the ferry &
they hit my brother's front door across
the ocean where he wakes up & finds
his floor covered in marbles &
he knows by now
i have been there too--

your red knot sister

i'll leave binoculars out for you,
for the next time i come home--
i'll set them on the staircase
up to the attic-- we're the 
bruises from our 
mother's african violets-- 
the finger prints no one
wipes off the glass--
misshapen purple thumbs--
this time you can watch for me--
see the embers burning to ash
across my back 
from tierra del fuego--
i'm flying back again from
a land of fire-- watch
as i drop my feathers
like atomic bombs-- shouting
all your bodies into shadows
on the living room walls--
we can make puppets 
out of our fingers 
we can pretend to be small 
enough again to hold the moon 
by its juicy white rind--
cut up the darkness 
& leave it in a metal bowl
in the sink-- 
spit stars out like seeds--
our father was always a watermelon
knife-- taught both of us
how to carve smiles our
of green jaws--
i want to know what it's like
to love a red knot-- the
bird with the longest migratory 
pattern-- the
bird whose home is an orbital path--
how does it feel to
watch me waver from here & there?
how could you love someone 
who can't help
but be in constant flight away 
from themself-- 
our father was like
this too-- 
in departure from his own fire--
sliced his teeth into the sink--
i drop my eyes on the beach like
horseshoe crab eggs-- angry orange
suns a glow in the absence 
daylight--
i waver in between-- a throat choked 
on all the words-- 
you wait for me to come back
as i always do-- 
the migratory sister-- a thumb
print on the outside of the window--
i'm going where i can set the snow on fire.
i stop on my way to the artic in our
back yard & we sit in the grass
beneath the christmas tree whose roots
we un-balled & taught how to take a fist
full of earth-- you tell me
to stay five minutes longer &
(like always) i leave early--
ducking under covered bridges & stopping
at a wawa to drink a diet orange soda
while i sit alone on my own bumper--
you see me with your binoculars 
as you look out from the attic-- i always
come back-- a body in migration & 
flame-- the sun coughed to make me &
to spite her i don't stop running--
a smoke signal reminding you that 
when all else fails you can always 
run-- fill your mouth with sun & 
drop feathers like bombs or
promises-- both equally as destructive
& equally as likely to leave shadows 
on the living room wall.

lost river caverns behind my knees

we all knew the caverns were 
a mouth-- 
skull full of calcite 
teeth-- the altar of a 
jaw bone-- you fill my
skull with bells-- let's
elope to the caves at the edge
of town-- the ones without 
spiders or snakes-- crawl
in the darkness where
the stone itself is too
alive to touch-- i told
you last week i wanted to run
away to the space behind my 
knees where the hair grows scraggly
& the tendons of my legs
make a space for me to hide myself--
i turn off the lights--
we are people of so many little
spaces-- bend down to sit with me--
i don't know where my 
blood is traveling anymore--
our lost rivers speak like
tongues through the caverns teeth--
i want to follow them-- let
the walls take me in--
make me into a stalagmite-- an obelisk
jutting out from the gums--
come back here & drop wet leaves
on me like bouquets-- 
i came here to tell you that
i love you like the space
behind my knees--
that there are rooms inside
me that you have to crawl to
on all fours-- open only in a drought
when they're not so flooded with
misplaced blood-- i'm still trying to
figure out where it comes
from & where it goes--
in the caves they told us they tried
to trace the origins of the 
lost river by filling it with
ping pong balls & i imagine 
maybe you could feed me marbles &
see if they end up under your tongue--
i want to know where it goes--
where all this blood could be going--
most nights i feel like i'm sleeping
under my mother's metal lids again--
the ones she used to keep my food warm 
while i decided if i was allowed to 
eat or not--
i wanted to wriggle beneath metal
hem & live in the warm & damp--
leave me here in this skull 
but remember i loved you big
enough to fill every empty space
ever filled by a river
still searching for a home--
you caused floods you were so full
of bells & every
time i try to follow the river
it gets me lost behind my knees--
if i leave the sun will seem wider
& i will seem smaller again
but inside the caverns of my 
own head i can turn on the lights 
& keep myself company--
we take tours down here occasionally
-- we have a chapel
& people used to get married in front
of the biggest wall of calcite--
now it's quiet & only the algae 
hums hungry when the lights go
out-- you would like it here-- behind
my knees
swallow ping pong balls with me--
lets get lost in our veins--
let's reach down as stalactites--
make chandeliers of our teeth & 
turn off the lights to
fill this cave with the sound
of our teeth growing again--
listen for the ghosts of faint bells 
& the clamor of a metal lid being lifted--
i am the girl beneath it who filled their skull
with cavern tours & 
lost rivers dyed red--