good boy

you eat my face off & i ask,
"how would you like the stars?"
we buy a ghost online hoping
it'll fix us. all it does is weep.
you blame me. you say,
"if i bought a ghost i would make sure
it was a good one." i want him
to be right. i find him in the upstairs.
he is opening & closing the door.
i tell him, "all we need is a little
haunting. something to make us
need each other." he doesn't want to
& i cannot blame him. instead,
we make cookies & i tell him about
how i do not know how to love
without destroying myself.
he does not have advice but it is
such a relief that someone knows
besides me. most of the time i feel
like i have whole planets inside me
that no one else sees. i guess that is
just consciousness. when i try
to tell you the truth all that comes out
are toads. they are beautiful but 
they are not what i mean to say.
i put the ghost to bed & return to you.
you say, "did you return him?"
i lie & say, "i did." you say, "good boy."
i eat my stars from a bowl & 
they taste like knots. i am trying
to regrow my hair. if i do i am thinking
maybe i could sell it & buy another ghost.
one that you would like. one that
would make us happy. me holding
you & asking, "did you see that?"

sandpaper 

my long-term plan is to get smoother.
to buy as much sandpaper as my credit card
will let me & set to work. i will likely start
with my elbows & move on there
to my knees. i am convinced 
i could work out my edges until i might
blend into the leaves. learn how to feast
on the sun like i've always wanted. 
sand away my mouth. watch it scatter
as dust. all those words broken into
wonderfully unmanageable parts. 
we lie in bed & i worry you'll notice
the work i've been doing. i scoot away.
don't let you touch me. become a top sheet
kind of boy. when i call friends
i have stopped being honest. how can you say,
"i don't know how i'm getting through
this week." instead you say the grape-flavor words
like, "i am rough but okay" & "i am made of soft wood."
the chickens are trying to kill the smallest one again.
they peck her & i wave my arms at them.
i tell her, "you can come with me." we'll both
whittle down until we become part of the sky.
i leave you a love letter urging you to join us. 
get smooth & leave the knuckles behind. 
blue bleeding into orange. no feathers
or flesh to grow scabs. the smoothest place.
a guest room without bedding. the window 
playing a video on loop across the veil. 
it's of just before we had bones. 
when we could fill our stomachs 
with the flying kind of birds & still sleep. 

to catch a whale 

i used to drop the fishing line
out the window of my bedroom
hoping to catch a whale.
my father taught me. showed how
to pluck out a tooth & tie it to
the thin line. he never caught one.
instead, he waited. thunderstorms
came & left. moss grew across his back.
i sometimes would find mushrooms.
my favorite were the tinniest ones
that bloomed around his neck.
waiting is my inheritance. a family story
says i am the descendent of 
the patron saint of "someday."
once my father felt a tug on the line.
i was small. the house have grown
another floor each day. clouds would
sometimes walk through the hall.
the lock on my door fell out &
all the house ghouls came to put
their eye in the hole where the knob
had been. i sat with him. he stood.
he asked me, "did you see that? it was
right there!" i had not seen it.
even now i am not totally sure he actually felt
a whale. i hope he did. i lied, the way
all daughters do to their fathers.
i said, "i did. i saw it." we held our breaths
as he felt the line again. nothing. i put
my finger there too. nothing but
a little thread. i did the same without him.
i kept having vision of calling him
in the middle of the night to say,
"i got one. i finally got one." 
i still don't know 
what we're supposed to do with them. 
maybe it would have become a house 
or maybe it would save us
or maybe it would just lay, all muscle & bone,
rotting in the front yard. 
become a feast for the crows. 

rest stop 

i buy a satellite from a vending machine.
all the ghosts are circling like sharks.
every time i pull over at a rest stop
i think about staying there forever. living
in that lush liminal. standing on the roof
of the wingless car waving as people
come & go. some, assumed into the clouds.
others, turning into dust. i drink a gritty coffee
& eat a swarm of locusts. my favorite rest stops
are the restless ones. the ones with blinking
lights & cars that won't start. a man who has
been turning to call down the moon for months.
i don't want a shiny place or one with clean glass.
i crave the anywhere-ness of the right kind
of side of the highway. in the middle of pennsylvania
the world can feel the size of a tongue.
or, when it is raining & grey, even smaller.
a pinwheel or a frog. if i stayed i think 
i would start a shrine. it would just be my
open trunk, or, once the car has run away too,
just my mouth. i would point & say,
"leave a note about the distance between
where you think you're going & where
you know you'll actually end up." the red lights
eat each other like tadpoles. i call you but
you don't pick up. the road becomes a ribbon.
i use it to wrap myself up tight as i can. 
remember the satellite. close my eyes 
& hear her blinking, taking pictures of us
from as far away as she can get. all blue 
& storm cloaked & bright.  

cathedral w/o

without windows. without a gun.
without stained glass. without a god.
without a father singing in the choir. without
a shovel to dig the bones out with. without
confession & without anything to confess.
without a place to go afterwards. without stone.
i take a knife. peel off the rind. 
all that's left is ringing. i list all the places i used
to have to lay face up like an offering.
i sleep easiest on the tongue of a giant.
turn over like the tilling of the soil in april.
soy beans are coming. corn lives under
our nails ready to burst & scream. 
a fresh kind of worship. eternal. like meeting
yourself at the end of a long night.
your fingers falling off like petals. nothing
lasts long enough. not the sun 
but especially not the teeth. each turning
into a bird & flying up to the rafters. 
every ghost has one place only they can go.
the sheets hung up like a blanket fort. like hide & go
speak. i find a valley of veils. it is a communion
or a wedding. it is night & no one knows 
where i am. the coyotes dance.
eat ruby meat. sleep inside each other.
nesting dolls. worship without walls. fell
just enough trees for a fire. each resulting shadow
running off to build fountains. without butter.
without a pair of shoes. without anyone else at all.
without a door. without a scythe. without 
a word for salvation, paired down.
knife in hand. nothing left but "save." 

(no) petting zoo

"you look with your teeth" they say
in the knot of tails & cage wire.
i get all the animal feed & bathe in it
with the hope i will be gone in just
one bite. in a dream we go to a glass party
& the room is full of donkeys.
we are told they are genetically modified
to be able to complete small talk
better than any autistic adult (that's me).
obviously, i panic. i'm not ready
for all this juice. the crushed cranberries
& the strangled limes. you are always
telling me not to worry while there
are dinosaurs in the yard. i say,
"what if i just have one touch?" i am told
the fur of the never deer is impossible 
to hold. the horses who have stopped horsing
really really long ago. i don't know how
to keep up with my friends. they turn
into kites that father's fly with their sons
in ugly parking lots. it's supposed to rain 
all week by which i assume there are
not very many reasons to be a bird.
i get this ridiculous idea that maybe i could
get on the other side. instead of wanting
maybe i could be the creature everyone
is not allowed to hold. i don't know
which is better. i get tired easily. there are
not enough trees to choke on. the giraffes
unfurl their tongues like flags. we are
a nation that has never seen a miracle. 
i have this terrible plan of becoming the first.
i go outside. beg for the animals. the snakes 
& the spiders & especially the vermin.
i want to get unholy. get grubby & real. 
none of them come. the zoo has no walls
& not even any popcorn. i call my mom
& she says she has a shovel i could borrow.
i don't want to though. i just want something
gentle & warm to lay down next to me.
to stroke my head & say, "no one 
is waiting for you." 

black pearls

i don't want to go home yet.
bite down on me until
i turn glossy & iridescent.
we drive with the headlights off.
i lie & tell you my house 
is tucked behind the moon.
let's keep going. the more we drive
the closer i get to telling someone the truth. 
i don't want to be crushed under
the tongue of this terrible down world.
i want a jeweler to pierce 
my throat. to hang me to
the neck of a mistress. we talk in lists.
of all the new horrors & the old
& how they both dance 
on a stage of teeth. i have started 
burying televisions. i google,
"what is martial law." i know
what it means but i want a machine
to say something different.
what if we were safe? what if 
instead of flesh we were born
of salt water & sand? sweet little
memory of a wonderful rain. 
when you pull over the chickens
call out in the dark. our eyes
like black pearls in the waning moon's
wild light. i think i could make
amazing earrings. i think i could
next time maybe tell you about 
how often i spend days 
the size of an eye lash. why 
are the people who are supposed
to love me always the first to
part the bivalve's lips. 
knife in the dark. you ask,
"what do you want me to do?"
i want to say, "stay. let's keep going.
drive until we reach an ocean."
instead, i admit the truth.
"i don't know how to fix this." 

girl dinner

i love to get the wrong kind of hungry.
cold canned beans with a wooden spoon.
a handful of knives & a sugar light bulb.
i have never learned how to eat. i want
it to be something about gender but
i know it has more to do with bodies 
& the werewolf in me. i open the back door.
let all the mice in & we go crawling 
on the foreheads of cardboard boxes together.
they say, "i thought you wanted a wedding?"
i tell them, "i have too much to do."
by which i mean, i have too much to devour.
my favorite times of my life were
the paper plate times. when everything 
was flammable. when i didn't need 
to remember exactly how far i went.
everything was snow & blood. the tongue
always has a gender & so does the stomach.
if i ever get out of this though i promise i'll cook
real people food. i'll be a wife with an apron
& thousands of ground beef recipes 
at the back of my throat. for now though,
i am the cutting board god. i eat the carrot
unpeeled with dirt still dusting wrinkled skin.
scoop hummus from the plastic container.
every little morsel. lick the spoons' head
& shoulders. i think it's ancestral. a hunger
like a lightning bolt through me & all 
the not-girls, mouths open in the dark. the desire 
to be full always escaping us. just another handful 
of wings. just one more lemon taste.
the shadow of an iris tree. 

mouth in the yard

at first i would feed it hair.
a strand or two tied in a bow.
i didn't tell anyone. 
i discovered long ago that it is best to 
dismantle yourself alone. put on
the cantaloupe face & say, "nothing
is eating me alive." the mouth 
has followed me all my life.
it used to be just the size
of a tiny ant hill. i mistook it for
the home of some kind of small creature.
brought it sunflower seeds just like
i used to feed the mice who came
to my bedroom at night. 
then it grinned at me. my hunger
became its hunger. pressing bottle caps
into the soil. i hate to smile
with my teeth showing. they've
always been crooked. in yearbook pictures
i would color my mouth in with sharpie.
just a gaping hole. the hole becoming
my entire head. it got bigger. asked for
fruit. an apple. a peach. i made it promise
not to scream. i was so scared
of hearing whatever noise it might devise.
it listened or at least so i thought.
the hole is never really part of you.
it is just a hallway through which
you try to be real. the mouth. the door.
the chimney. in biology class i sat 
in rows & learned about the bodies
of sponges. one long passageway
through which priests walk dangling
their little incense cauldrons. laying 
with a lover he once asked,
"what is something you've never
told anyone?" i thought about 
telling him the truth. about showing him
the mouth that follows me.
we lived in the city so the mouth dwelled
at the corner of the nearest parking lot.
instead, i made up a story about
craving the moon. he asked,
"like an astronaut?" i said, at least somehow 
honestly, "no, like a great big gumball.
something to chew to death on."
today i bring the mouth rotten bananas.
they're slimy & sick. the mouth
accepts everything, but especially
the dead & decaying. the mouth has
never spoken but i think if it did 
it would say, "please keep me" as if i have
a choice. as if its hunger is not my own. 

ancient girlhood

we would shovel out the sun from behind
the wall of clay. 
at daybreak, i took off my fingernails
one by one. replaced them with tree cuttings.
laid down in the valley where 
no one else will go. i think to be a girl is
to be a specific kind of hungry. no one would
come with me. they all wanted
to sleep in & suck on sugar stones. 
i ate a bird whole. felt the wings beating.
i always arrive like this.
with an urge to find out all 
of what i might contain & what might 
contain me. the roots tear me like
bark pulled from the stomach. i worry that
one day my skin might get so thin
that all the stars start crawling out
& i am left like a sieve with nothing
else to catch. the bugs are girls & the tree
are girls & i am somehow not. do we always 
define ourselves through a lack? i am not
you & yet you are a thorn-sized hole
in the skirt i used to wear. all holes widen.
become deer paths. become genders.
little lights in the dark. like moths,
here we come. not the sun. not sure
exactly why or how we are supposed to
satiate ourselves in this kind of muck.
the trees bear fruit. i eat it until i am sick.
my gender gets real lost. loses her eyes.
i come back hollow. wind blows
through me easy as a winter ash. 
everyone else is painting their lips red 
so i join them. the sun burrows again
like a fat toad. all that's left are mouths 
& the ancestors still searching for
their skin too. their teeth ring.