Funerals for our Christmas tree siblings:
Pizzelle stump and feral cat hymn-- 

Did you ever love someone 
like a Christmas tree? 
So eager to die slowly as a spectacle
of lights and tinsel--
drink tea from your feet--
I understand my Christmas tree
like my brothers can't--
I listened to him when they shook
off his dead needles at the farm--
bound him in orange netting--
caged against 
the roof of the station wagon---
He was cold-- wanted to wear my mittens
and the yellow sweater left
over from a grandmother who
wrote love letters in pizzelles--
pizzelles like the stumps of trees
writing each year in a pressed arabesque--
We remember the trees names--
keep their stumps on the mantel--
thumb print tomb stones that smell
like forgetting-- 
He cried about his roots
growing numb-- lodged in the vertebrae
of the mountain that over looks
Kuztown: blue silhouette 
of a sleeping dragon--
breaths us
in barn bond fires--
We teach the freshly
cut tree about hot chocolate and family--
Oh Christmas trees who have
been our temporary siblings--
we've woken up and listened
to the weather channel sing
quiet Christmas songs before school days--
dressed you in our glass relics--
your arms to hold the fragile 
spheres formed only
from fragment memory--
candy canes plucked from your
hair and a string of lights
hot against your body to keep
you warm when the house
inhales winter from the windows--
It's harder to know that you're 
only visiting--
I've had so many Christmas tree siblings
and I think only I'm still mourning them--
me and the feral cats who
visit their corpses in the backyard--
sing hymns and clatter the bins
of diet coke cans like bells
we watch green turn orange--
turn skeleton-- turn bone--
turn into another passing of Christmas--
graceful like the death of 
my grandfather-- sleepy 
in a shawl of whiskey and night--
he still sits on the porch and smokes
cigars sometimes and watches
us decorate the Christmas tree
with ornaments reflecting fragments 
of his own memory--
He eats pizzelles and everyone
can think of a how warm it
felt to see our Christmas tree sibling
shake her hips on the eve-- 
only then could we forget about her dying--
I've had brothers and sisters of pine
and each one dances different on the eve--
some help us pour milk for Santa--
count carrots for the reindeer--
when we unplug the lights 
he sips more tea from his feet and stays
up to watch the floor pile with 
presents-- eats pizzelles 
and remembers Christmases that 
only the hand blown ornaments still do--
I know you'll be leaving again
and I know we'll cut off your stump
to remember you-- trust me 
I'll say your name in the morning
with the others-- I don't forget
you and I don't forget how you danced
and held the collected memory of
our family in your arms--
I won't forget how scared you were to
be cut and I'll remember your roots
being swallowed again into the soil--
you-- I call you brother
I call you sister 
I call you Christmas tree
and the feral cats and me will
sing your body into an ornament--
you refract with us-- 
hum quiet Christmas songs
and wait for Santa to eat us
both into crumbs. 
The feral cats ring the diet coke
cans-- and winter breaths gentle
in the windows. 

Everyone goes to the King of Prussia Mall 
shopping for an apology:
We drink bubble tea 
by the blue tile fountain--

We all started to feel
drawn toward the King of Prussia
Mall again-- 
Everyone goes. 
Not out of 
desire but out of a ritual 
planted as pennies 
in our wrists by the evergreen
trees-- this year
we started sleeping on
pine needles by November-- 
a dream of
self-mutilation-- at
least we smelled like a forest
on the mall floor--
Oh! We are born
in December again to learn how to 
wrap an apology not a manger
We drink pink bubble tea 
by the blue tile fountain
when our arms get tired of 
the shopping bags-- 
I say I'm sorry I didn't bring 
any pennies--
You say you don't understand 
bubble tea and that you
were sorry for so many things
you wouldn't know what wrap
with ribbons this year-- 
We played marbles with the
tapioca orbs and 
watched them float around the 
fountain water like 
God had dropped a bag of planets
-- my mother used
wrapped her "sorry"s in banana bread
and rainbow yarn--
and my father wrapped his
in plastic dinosaurs and 
juju bees--
Oh darling was it worth wrapping
at all?
Save the ribbons for when
you hold me down tonight--
I'm trying to tell her 
I'm sorry I'm not warm like
hands around a mug of coffee--
I can't kiss you right-- get stuck in
your teeth like toffee--
I'm not thick or sturdy 
like bricks of fudge but
love you can build a gingerbread
house out of me-- 
We dragged ribbons of receipts
behind us-- worn
like shawls-- these printed 
promises to get better-- we are going 
to get better
this year
-- we're wrapping
an apology this year and we swear it
will at least have a bow--
All my past lovers have
always had the best apologies 
to wrap and never keep--
click me like a silver necklace
and keep me steady in the hands 
of your pocket watches--
there's never been enough 
apologies to teach someone to 
love you-- I want a 
person who can admit they'll
never be as thick as block of fudge
but willing to try to be staircase--
So we picked up the pennies from the
fountain and apologized again
for taking someone else's wishes
even though the water already 
forgot them-- they had already
become a tray of thumb print
cookies or a jar of peppermint bark--
say you're sorry like
the floor of the mall covered in pine
needles where we have to sleep
and get up early to start
wrapping all these apologies--
stay with me and when everyone else
rolls over to dream we can bathe 
in the blue tile fountain--
drink pink bubble tea until
the water turns to tapioca orbs--
undress from ribbons of receipts 
and write "I'm sorry" 
on each other's forearms--
Oh that's all I wanted-- 
if you don't expect me to be a necklace
or the warm belly of a mug
I think I might love you--
You don't need to apologize for
not being a shopping bag
or juju bee--
neither am I-- all I think
I am anymore is bold 
enough to bathe in the 
blue tile fountain with
you-- this year we can 
split Auntie Ann's pretzels on the floor 
of the King of Prussia Mall--
wipe butter on our jeans and 
wait out this season--
apologize with lips and
skin
and linger like toffee 
and the smell of the 
pine needles still pricking
our knees.
Sit by the blue tile fountain with
me-- Oh, and no I don't
understand bubble tea either--
but it's pink like
you and me. 

Bubblegum pillows, my mother's
brown socks, and sleeping as tight
as a root beer barrel.

When I was ten I collected
bubble gum under my pillow--
A showcase furnished by
orphaned nickles and 
green ocean foam pennies
I would scour for coins in the 
depths of warm sock chasms
and the foothills of mismatched
mittens in the laundry closet--
this was no man's land
this was where we all
fumbled in the morning to
put together a person
from clothing that
smelled like a pile of rain
-- sometimes
I wore my mother's socks 
and felt different and sneaky
and older and tired like
a pillowcase--
The dollar store had been my jeweler-- 
I had wanted one of every
color--evidence of my regalia 
from the bottom bunk bed
of the rain forest-- kissed
pillow blue goodnight-- 
these are sapphire raspberry gum
orbits--stripes of orange and 
kiwi stacked like my uncle's
staircase that winces
when you climb it to bed-- 
A handful of prisms and confetti
to chew into distorted rainbow--
this is what it smells like after it
rains-- like wilting caramel 
and pillowcases--
and bed time stories coiling
shiny candy wrapper wrinkles--
slept blow pop scepter and
a dream of my father-- gas station
stops on the way to Fleetwood where
we bottled ourselves up 
in the blankets of root beer barrels--
bubble gum blow a dream into 
the blue again where he discovers
I'm wearing my mother's 
brown socks that smell like
rain or raspberries-- We put-on
each other's shirts for bed--
my father's Beatles ts down
to me knees back into another
bubble gum night
where I count my sugar gems
before bed--
This is my dynasty from under the covers
This is where I tell my brother
bed time stories
of dollar stores and gas stations--
someday I want my living 
room to feel like a dollar store--
with enough quarters you
can buy every piece of me-- 
these jewels were meant to be swallowed
into dreams--
but only if you dig in the 
valley of socks-- make puppets
with your hands and laugh--
laugh like bubblegum you 
were always a princess here--
we don't actually believe in 
quarters in my living room--
we believe in finding
sapphire raspberry gumballs in
the seat cushions and kissing
blue goodnight in a pillow--
walking in the socks of our mothers 
and feeling crafty and sly-- 
and careful not to 
wake the sleeping gem stones
hidden beneath our heads--
My whole family sleeps 
like root beer barrels
and tells bed time stories from
bottom bunks.
Some night I wake up and 
forget that I still have
quarters left over from
the washing machine-- but 
I spent the last ten years
eating my way through a collection
of jewels-- now I sleep
like blankets-- smell root beer
barrels on my wrists--
whisper to my father to turn
out the night light 
in my bed room alone with
the sound of raspberry
and the smell of rain falling
on the doors to
the laundry closet--
I wake up in 
my mother's brown socks. 

My horseshoe crab blood, Puff the Magic Dragon
And how to remember to say goodbye 
in broken conch crowns.

I am only sorry that I never said
goodbye-- a dragon deserves at
least that-- I know-- 
And it's a selfish thing to do
to get taller--
and we knew
each other more than scales--
piled soda tabs and pocked broken
shells enough to make our
dresser drawers into museums--
I've only every wanted to save
broken objects and I got old enough to
find the cracked people the shells
belonged to-- it's us-- it's me 
and you and the topsy shoulders 
of a conch-- the hollowed crown
that once housed the
princess of all the horseshoe crabs--
I used to live by the sea for one
week in July-- sung there
by a blue station wagon or a car radio
or the out of key Kumbaya I craved 
from my mother--
It's funny how she said she didn't sing--
because our mothers
are the only ones who can ever really
sing to us--
was it the year that we were ocean urchins
that we met dragons by the sea?
horseshoe crab siblings tossing each
other for luck-- I called you 
brother and you didn't know
what to call me--
when you're seven you can
make a week into a life time--
Leave only to 
spend Novembers wondering
how you could have lived so long
and so short 
in such a small body
of multitudes-- 
ask youself if you had grown
scales or if it was only
another dream pulled over
our heads by the passing of 
wave--how many times
you must have sung the same songs
until they were merely part of the
way you breathed and the harvest of 
cracked sand dollars-- we would
pretend we lived by the sea
all year round--
born crawling from the surf
on the back of a sung-wing dragon
who lumbered closer in the mist--
we never knew him well-- kissed him
behind willow tree-- passing him
back and forth
until we almost kissed each other 
only we were both horseshoe crabs--
and you were the dragon--
No one knew we were hidden or
that we had watched the waves to
learn how to kiss each other like
water meeting land meeting mosquitoes--
we small bodies of multitudes loving
dragons who we could barely see in the mist--
Oh but could he sing! He could
sing like a mother should
but quiet enough to sustain us
farther than a car radio-- melodious
he puffed clouds
into a night sky to veil the stars 
in their own cotton dress clipped
together by broken conch shells-- 
I hummed our beach a name
Hanolee Hanolee, A land called Hanolee-- 
tattooed my foot print into the
sand next to my mother-- wiped
mosquito bites from my wrists
like watches-- measured time
in the waves tossing and
turning under the eyes of another
impending cloud who kissed into
the night--November autumn-- when the
ground would start to blush every
morning and we couldn't see each
other as well in the mist -- take 
my blue horseshoe crab blood
from the mosquitoes-- paint our
names on the backs of the sand dollars
for our museum--
I still keep 
my knees prickly and purple blushed 
as ocean urchins-- 
hold me dragon boy like an unruly plum--
we found ourselves
tossed into an 
Autumn mist
yet again 
as the song always sings
itself out of tune from my mother
by the vigil of a nightlight 
and a prayer for the tattoos 
rubbed away by another belly
of a horseshoe crab--
We drove home in the blue station wagon
and we left you there
with the dressers of broken 
sea shells, the cotton dress
dangling next to the moon
and our blood lingered in the bellies
of mosquitoes falling victim
to our melancholy--
I'm old enough to know you're not magic--
or at least you're not more magic
than the multitudes I could contain
when I was seven--
oh what would it take to kiss
you again? The blink of a scale?
The tossing of a tide--
the hollowed out crown of a 
horseshoe crab mother
singing 
Puff the magic dragon 
lived by the sea-- and frolicked 
in the autumn mist in a land called
Hanolee--
I remembered to say goodbye
too late like we always do--
it's that our role as urchins? 
To forget and be reminded by
the autumn mist
the car radio
and November. 
That's what broken shells are 
for-- the approximations 
of dragon scales
and our feet tattooed next
to our mother's in the sand. 

you made me origami 
and we fell like folded satellites
to the sound of the rain in the gutter--

what was it that you did
that made me fold 
into tin foil origami?
i Kusudama bloom and Crane
wings into orbit-- bend my
tail into a skull and let my
wings blink red and white--
to be mistaken for sea-sick stars--
did you crease me tight enough to 
make it through the atmosphere of
another planet? this is why
we fold with metal-- take pictures
of the planets-- our sisters
who wear the rings of their husband
to bed and take off everything else
in a full length mirror also 
known as the palms of our hands 
we lens voyeurs who fold ourselves 
coiled as Lotus and and Kawasaki 
roses that keep pivoting until
they become another planet--
we sat together to watch Saturn
undress and I told you not to
take pictures-- watched her
standing in front of that mirror--
smug with her own brass creases and
the sound of rain or sleet on her
shoulders-- collected her moons
around her belly like marble-bubble soap--
this is the sound of a rain gutter
and the haunt of another car pulling out
fingers over the asphalt-- the thrash of the corn
when she's lonely and wishing
someone would take her picture again--
everyone wants to be watched in the mirror--
everyone wonders what they could fold themselves
into if they had enough brass or
tin foil-- or hands that could remember
patience was brass and coronet--
flap Crane wing of bronze and rain--
pull me loose in ribbons from 
the brown hair of the clouds-- make the night sky
modest again so Saturn can learn 
to not make such a show of undressing--
she should leave her comets on until
we're done crawling back into 
the star boxes where we belong--
i folded Cranes in silver
and gold paper on my night stand
when i was ten.
i counted them
by the brown paper bag-full 
because i had wanted 
one-thousand-- enough to wing-beat
the glimmer of the moon-- enough
to challenge the quantity of visible
stars-- enough to send on quests to 
take pictures-- jostle past satellites
stealing wing-beat and flashbulb--
enough to weld the torn
sternums of her rings-- balance
moons in this orbit--
forgive me for traveling so far 
just to fold something for you--
we don't fold paper-- we fold forged in
brass and hedge clippings off
the over grown moons who act like
vines when you get close enough to 
asking Saturn what her real name is--
but yes we were left here to bloom
in Kusudama and Crane wing-- 
welded to the constant turning
of the rain in the gutter--
we didn't need paper-- we were
just counting the satellites 
that get mistaken for queasy stars--
jostled by Saturn's nightly
display-- look at her sway
she look just like you and me--
another Kawasaki rose-- turned
and turned tight watch face-- 
in a rain gutter--

The dessert buffet thief, sequin purses,
and crayon hieroglyphs--

My mother taught me I was a 
buffet thief.
When I got back to
our blue station wagon
from Moselem Springs
breakfast buffet I had a
sequin purse full
of peanut butter cookies--
scooped crumbs from the zipper
and licked the sugar granules
from my palms and buttery
dust from under my nails--
I wasn't very good at practicing 
to be a LADY-- I was never
meant for flowery hats or white
gloves-- I took off my shoes and
hid them under the pews at church 
So I could feel God on the cold
tile floor-- 
My mother told me
I was sneaky 
and that was what worried her.
I was wearing a dress printed
with purple flowers--
wedding cake white shoes made of
marzipan and dinner plates-- 
Have you ever dropped a communion wafer?
Have you ever dropped God?--
I know you have you can tell me--
You can tell me if you steal 
from dessert buffets too--
I've never been able to stop
even though we always went after church--
God kept a track of all the Andes 
Mints I stuffed in my gloves--
tally marks written in blue crayon
on the back of another paper place-mat--
I harbored German Chocolate cake squares--
purloined from their perches on 
tiny dishes.
The cake squished between birthday dollar
bills in my purse-- this is
how we teach girls how
to be LADYS-- about how to eat from
tiny plates and coil
into flowery hats--
into Sunday brunch--keep
your butter and sugar and peanut
butter tucked away where they
can't see it behind the sequins
and eat cake from a back
seat with your finger nails--
I wrote letters on the backs
of the paper place-mats
in four-packs of crayon--
red--green--yellow--blue-- 
Red like strawberry cheesecake 
veiled in napkins--
Green hard candies from the 
bowl outside the bathroom--
Yellow frosting flowers 
to stain my white shoes
Blue berry tart bleeding 
through my zippers-- there
isn't enough room in a purse to 
eat everything--
I admit I dropped a communion wafer
once and I didn't pick it
up off the cold tile floor right
away-- I thought about
my feet on the floor
and the body on the floor and 
the minister scowled
as a I keeled to scoop
him back up-- eat sneaky 
like a peanut butter cookie
only tasting like air-- 
steal God from gold plates 
and hidden in sequin purses--
my bare feet on the tile floor
and my mother telling
me to put my shoes back on--
I wrote letters to the waiters
in blue crayon only I didn't use
words-- I drew purple flowers 
and peanut butter cookies 
and the spiral, spiral, spiral
of a pinwheel peppermints--
It doesn't matter if they read them
because the most important thing
to do with our mouths
is to let them be written
even if we eat from back seats--
yes mother I'm sneaky--
and I pick up God off the floor
of the church next to my bare feet--
I wasn't meant for marzipan shoes
and my purses are still full
of stolen peanut butter cookies--
I'm a crumb queen-- a goddess
of butter stain-- what is a LADY
but a white table clothe 
and a empty purse-- I don't go
to the buffet to worship God--
that's what I use a tile floor
for-- I go to the buffet to
unzip my mouth and leave with all 
the red and white mints-- breath
winter like a cigarette--
Make my own hymnals on the paper
place-mats for the waiters to sing
when they notice I'd taken the whole
dessert table for myself--
I've made this sequin purse
into a rib cage to hide all the sugar
I've been missing.
Yes, mother I'm sneaky.
Yes, father I write purple flowers
and walk barefoot through buffets--
I don't fit on small plates
and don't try to tell me
I'm all you can eat--

On Tuesday all the door knobs fell off and
the almanacs told us to make
French toast--

If I recall correctly it was a 
Tuesday when the house started to lose
door knobs-- wobbled like 
baby teeth or the wiggle legs 
of the green dining room chairs
that we used to put almanacs under--
If any of us had read the almanacs
we could have predicted this--
we would have seen that this
is the year of falling doors and 
elbows that unravel like cordial cherries--
We all woke up as warm together 
as a cinnamon bun skillet-- winter
broke us open in blood and syrup--
chocolate on our lips we crawled on hands 
and knees to see where the doorknobs 
had rolled away to-- 
We swore we heard  them laughing 
in the distance
like tiny screws and wind chimes--
or maybe they were taken
by the mice who hoard candy wrappers
and baby teeth in the
basement-- 
the first to go was the doorknob 
to my bed room and you
didn't know if you were allowed
to come inside anymore--
I said that the door was open--
It was always open now but
you didn't know how you were supposed to
get inside until the hinges also
receded and I had no more 
walls left-- only the glass
bookcase leaning in the corner 
where we displayed all of our Almanacs
and inside the back covers were lists
of all the years when we lost baby teeth--
Not many people know that the mice
are the tooth fairies-- only they
think of teeth like
gem stones-- harvested from
the colder side of a dream--  
pay our children in pennies and quarters
and dollar bills they save from
washing machine raids-- 
The doorknobs to kitchen left next
and we took to making french toast in the
hallway-- and the oven was in the living room
where we all melted cordial cherries
and broke open like red stem
and chocolate-- next we used the coffee
tables as stove-tops and forgot
what it was like
to have a bed room to sleep in--
we dressed night in chocolate-- tight
coils of dough and cinnamon-- you
asked if we needed icing and I 
remembered that the mice also stole
all the screws and the bolts-- you
would be surprised at how much is held together
using only our belief in gravity
and walls leaning into each other--
as we lean into each other
on wobbly green chairs in the living room--
I love you so much like
French toast and I never needed
a door knob to know it-- I don't
know where they went or if they will
be coming back but we never needed
them top open each other-- 
The last to disappear was the front door--
What is a house without a front door?
Were we only a kitchen in a hallway--
only a skillet mouth filled with French 
toast-- people breaking like
cordial cherries in the basement 
Where the mice re-purposed our
door knobs for their rituals-- 
wrote almanacs to leave in our glass
book case and under the legs
of the wobbling green chairs-- 
Yes, we all expected things to fall--
we always expect things to fall-- unravel 
But what we weren't expecting was how
the house fell so gently into itself--
how somehow we all wobbled and shook
but that we didn't fall-- picked up
baby teeth like crystals to put
back into each other's mouths--
we leave each other French toast
kisses and sleep in the doorways
so we know that the walls don't
leave us alone-- we never needed
a front door to open to make
a house of this oven-- as long
as there's still cherries there
will always be something to cover in
chocolate-- and next year when the
door knobs come back we might
forget what it was like to fall
apart into each other-- forget
about the mice in the basement
but it's okay because a part of loving is
forgetting and learn to remember
that the door knobs aren't
the only ways we can make
this house a skillet on a Tuesday-- 

Poems for boys I've met before, 
Our metamorphosis on marble counter tops,
and finding you again over a phone call. 

I've never met anyone once.
You don't get to know me first
because poets pick up people
like geodes-- we aren't stamp collectors--
we shift for fern fossils with our
fathers so we can learn how to make
another person out of the silt
-- I tell you 
I see you like a metamorphic rock 
and I don't believe in diamonds or amethyst
but I do believe in Quartzite
and marble counters where you'll find
me rolling out my wrists in 
another pie crust--
I'll bring you apples and cinnamon
to sleep with in the blankets-- I remember
the oven coils of the earth
that formed us both with
the first spoken word in the dark--
I know it's unfair to meet someone
who has already met you on a back
corn field road but trust me
this is how we make granite--
this is how the corn learns to 
lean on each other and get
through another snowcone-headed dusk--
poured over the day in iridescent syrup--
Do you like me like rose or lavender
or amethyst?
Have you met me too and do you just like
to watch the dusk turn water melon 
and peach skin and blushed apples?
I remember something about
your hand prints in the fern fossils
in a valley of sand-- I remember 
your voice breaks geodes into rock candy
or snowcones-- 
On this gravel road 
I discovered 
that the foxes are the ones
who bake the stones into layers-- 
churn the earth into dough--
make people into marble counters
to find each other on-- crack geodes like eggs
and knead the earth's pale crust-- 
The foxes eat the left over watermelon 
rinds from the garbage--
and lick dusk from there paws--
I've known everyone at some
point or another-- and I met you 
again in a phone call--
you laugh like quartzite you know?
Has anyone ever told you that
you have the voice of peach skin?
Next time I'll meet you on a gravel
country road-- well wait for the foxes 
or for the pie to fill the room
with cinnamon--
This isn't an introduction
this is a metamorphism-- this
is how we name stones-- 
and how I introduce myself
with my head of snowcone syrup and
my voice spoken into the dark--

Alien flower morning-- 
sugar grain letters from Jupiter and 
how we whispered in spearmint--

Is it April or August 
when the Alien flowers 
grow?
~I ask my father every year 
even though we never know when
they're coming-- they don't
grow from the grass or from 
the thickets of onion-boiled weed
around the house-- the Alien flowers
sprout one lone stalk-- lighthouses--
beacons-- obelisks to a 
God with someone else's name-- 
pink-purple lip monuments to a
mother with oven mitts on both hands 
who uses the soil in place of brown sugar--
we called them Alien flowers before
we knew their mother lived
on Jupiter-- pressed their sweet
leaves-- cookie cut by 
discarded space ship wings-- 
pounded the dough in the fall of 
asteroids becoming lavender 
rock candy in the atmosphere--
She's trying to tell us about
her life there but she doesn't speak
human and before her children
left Jupiter they had once spoken
to each other in edible flowers--
garnished the house in agave orchid
and African violets on the staircase
every morning to tell her they loved
her and to tell her they were all leaving
and never coming back the same-- they 
returned in a space crafts and made speech 
with their tongues--
My brother and I understand because we 
sometimes speak in lavender to say goodnight
from these bunk beds--
whisper with the spearmint 
in the backyard--
We learned herb languages to tell
the stories that mouths forget--
grew our roots in the yard and held
onto each others onion-bulbs-- 
--caught the love letters from
Jupiter once a year-- mist tasting vaguely
like bubble gum dust-- leave
the candy wrapper to get stuck in the grass--
Humans don't remember that
the air on Jupiter is made from
confectioners sugar-- the soil
is purple-bruised from stray
celestial photography and the thumb prints
of astronauts-- the Jupitarians
once ate meringues and watched earth 
quiet like a soup bowl-- stirred
a long bony finger in the syrup
of the night sky and laughed about
how pink and vulnerable our skin is
even just standing in the sun--
freckle spattered with dandy lion hair--
Oh humans are funny things on their backs
in a soup bowl singing the alphabet 
as if each letter were going to 
finally become a hyacinth--
but Jupiter mother's children 
grew restless-- wiped the sugar
from their eye brows in the morning
and threw themselves away across
the atmosphere-- and the staircase
went silent without the African violets--
and no one ate pancakes and 
traded daffodils and the mother 
pressed the lips of Alien flowers
in the hopes her children would remember
what it was like to breath sugar
and talk foliage-- sent her 
love in grains breathed silent 
as a dandy lions losing their hair
before death-- making wishes for
themselves-- 
My brother and I would find the
Alien flowers out there--
walk into a mist barefoot before
the house had drunk enough coffee 
to remember anything but
the sound of falling lavender rock candy--
And my brother and I knew what the
flowers were saying 
because we used to talk in spearmint 
leaves and boil onion grass in the
microwave--   
She was so lonely out there--
bruised by satellites and calling
her children home with each petal--
she tells them she loves them even
if they give up her language of
flowers-- even if they only
return to take her picture--
even if they stop believing in sugar--
And the next day the Alien flowers are
gone and only my brother
I remember how carefully they 
spoke and how perfect each petal was
and how the whole yard was a 
cacophony of purple oven mitts--
She stirs us gentle with the stem
of another Alien flower and we wait
from a windowsill to 
count her stanzas in the dew again--
We speak Jupiter--
we eat spearmint and sugar--

Catch me in a crystal cave August 
and I'll take you where all the stars
fell and grew into corn fields--

Seal me inside my mother's mason 
jars-- rows of suspended raspberries
and the runny blueberry sauce
from summers ago when my
brother and I discovered
dirt and knees and what
it meant to be dried by the sun--
collected freckles like cherries-- We save 
fireflies next to the jam 
in the mason jars-- pickle their
bright abdomens until the cabinets glow
in the kitchen when the light only
comes from what's left
of a street lamp or a drowsy moon--
My brother and I sneak here
to eat Milano cookies in the dark
and I tell a ghost story that scares us both--
we sleep on the floor of my
parents bed room and watch the 
stars move in the bellies
of fireflies out the window--
Sneak out the back door and
scavenge enough
stars to make the crystal caves into our
own sky-- this is where we first loved--
this is where we echoed louder than raspberries 
shouted to wake up the moon
-- this is where I learned that in
the dark we were both only
pockets
to keep pieces of light in-- and the rain
was just another rung of our ribs--
and so the power would go out 
in another lightning storm and it
was either August or June--
Wednesday or Sunday-- and we'd 
be looking for our baptism candles 
and matches and find our way through
our house that was also somehow a corn field
and a thicket of raspberries 
and the wide white toothed mouth of a cave--
The thunder cracks open
mason jars in the cabinets and everything glows
on the kitchen floor-- 
boiled berry fires or 
hazy stars coming into bloom--
A celestial vine held over the churning
battery factory lights--
That's where my father works 
sitting beyond the corn like a 
broken kingdom-- that's where all our fathers
worked and collected fireflies in
their pockets to bring home for
us in the morning-- my father
drank diet soda and counted the stars
reflections in a mirror
while my brother and I slept on
the floor of my parents bed room--
we ate breakfast while he ate dinner--
all of us damp from dew and the storm
and the water dripping to build
stalagmites in the crystal caves-- 
I don't miss Kutztown-- but I miss
the mason jars and we what we left
of ourselves still echoing over
the startled leg hairs of the corn--
we siblings bathed in rain and collecting 
the fireflies in our pockets 
in the hopes somehow we could keep
their lights from going out 
or falling into the grass--
The batteries my father made
were never as bright as his
jeep head lights-- the night 
was never as long as a
thunder storm-- sweep
the glass off the kitchen floor
before the jam gets sticky-- 
Boil the fireflies in your pockets
until they turn back into stars.