on the floor of our childhood bedrooms tonight

these rooms do not exist. we have since 
stripped the walls. moved into the attic
& the basement & the closet. we do not live
where we used to. but tonight, i am having
a seance. we are holding hands. two brothers 
& the husks of corn. the open windows.
an emptied house. i think of the darknesses
we shared. how, for years, you were the one
i would wake up when i was alone in 
the middle of the night. me, the older brother
who should have never been afraid. we told
terror stories. all of them were about our father.
the forest of my room. the ocean of yours.
we held our breath. swam deeper. found the
angler fish. her light pulling us back to sleep.
i lay down. see the sky open. the same clouds
that have always roosted above me. i ask you,
"where should we take this place." there are 
no burials for rooms. for the times they held.
our parents are asleep. our parents are ghost walking
upside down on the ceiling. our parents
do not recognize us in the dark. you are me
& i am you. our faces like clay. i reach for yours/mine.
there is always the journey back. the citrus 
of the coming sun. i ask you, "how should
we keep each other?" you do not know
& the night is ending. the stars are returning
to the bag of sugar next to the coffee machine.
i want to ask you if you think this place
we've been was holy or at least sacred. &, if so,
were we the only ones who saw it? the return
of a crooked closet door. my ribs on the carpet.
the stain from a nail polish sleep over. 
sometimes we were both girls. sometimes
we were both boys. other times, we slid
back into our skin. me the top bunk
& you the bottom. the mice ate our sunflower
seed offerings. the moon cracked open wide. 

lanternfly winter

it would be so nice to have
a disappearing time. to shrink again
to the size of a grain of salt.
i do not remember how the lanternflies winter.
maybe as eggs or maybe as thoughts
in our heads when we lay & dream of
the coming wild ugly summer. i want it to downpour.
for heat to flap its wings against my skin.
each year it is hotter. we should savor 
the cold or we should savor the sun or
we should live each year like it will be 
the last. did dinosaurs talk to each other
about retirement? did they think they
were going to get old when they all
turned into museum fodder? 
i am told everything is ending. i don't know
how i am supposed to 
get the fire going. when we split wood
we often find little pockets of wintering bugs.
sleeping ants & centipedes. they wake up
when we place the wood beside the stove.
they scramble. i admit to them,
"i am sorry there is nowhere to go."
here is where our survivals bump up
against one another. i feed some of the ants
to the fire, unsure of where else i could
take them. when we are gone will we be
like wintered lanternflies? alive only
in the deepest veins of rotten wood? in
the cracked-egg thoughts of another creature
who is just as hurried & afraid? 
yes, despite all of that i want a least a few
more holy junes. to buy a house with you
away from everything. pretend there
that we are the last humans on earth.
watch the lanternflies emerge 
from our mouths & ears 
to scream at the swelling moon. 

storm dinner 

i tell you "i am making a plate for the storm."
one of the blue & white dishes. sliced apple.
fresh pasta. three leaves of basil. i smell
my fingers when i'm done picking it
from the stalwart plant on the windowsill. 
ice is falling from the purple sky. i do not know what
we should ask the spirit for. as time goes on
our wants become vaguer. pastel lungs
smudged along a leaking sunset.
i used to be able to pinpoint my yearning.
now, it is like a bruise. thumb placed
in the middle. soft pressure. here is where
the hurt comes from. blood & bumper cars.
one thing i know for sure is that the storm is ravenous.
has come without warning. without a day
of grey skey. has come on the back of 
a snow geese flock. the birds break & fall.
brew a cup of tea. spearmint. watch the steam
pour out into the sky as crystals fall. i step
slowly & carefully. i read posts that say,
"do not doom scroll." what if the doom scrolls you?
digs in your flesh, eager for some kind 
of pot of gold? i take down my hood.
let the ice bathe me. i had imagined going
with you. instead, you said, "will you take it out
for us?" i told you, "i will. i will." 
my phone confesses in my pocket that there are new wars 
& that this country has no more wheels.
that we will have to walk the rest of the way.
my kind has always had to walk. our footprints
with the deer & the wolves & even the rats. 
the storm devours. takes the plate from my hands.
already veiling it in heavy snow. i thank him or her
or it or them for receiving me. for putting
this food on their tongue. i make only one request,
"please, help us eat."

trench

my dad likes to tell me about
trench warfare whenever i call him
trying to be his son. he keeps a shovel 
beneath his tongue. we are a family
who digs. he puts on his world war one face
& slips between the folds of the earth.
i find trenches wherever i go.
some of them are full of sea monsters
& some of them are full of people
who want to kill me. i used to want
to tell him how scared i am 
of the world i'm living in. now,
i have mostly given up. i know
he can't save me. the whole thing
about trenches is you always need a new one.
they are an instrument of taking 
the land. here is my soil. here is the border
from which i end & you begin. 
curtains for gills. the smell of rotting birds.
he finds rats. names them after
his kids. puts them in tiny uniforms
& instructs them to fight alongside him.
there is no war & there is always a war.
both in our house & in this country.
i wish he could see the one i'm fighting.
the one where my friends disappear
& the one where my government wants eat me.  
the truth about my father is 
that he is too old to fight
most gods. he holds a gun like a spatula.
i remember how, once, in the middle
of winter we went out into the field.
i dug at the cold earth until i had 
a place to hide. there is nothing for me
in a trench. the ghosts there are hungry 
& have nothing to say. my father is
not my father there. on the phone he details
to me exactly how his men advanced.
how the bullets came. there are no bullets.
the clouds have taken to bullets. 
i do not want to be a man anymore
but i know i am. i have seen the soil turned.
the bone beneath flesh. the edge of a shovel
turn into the edge of a knife. then, also, i have been
my father in the shadows, dressing 
the rats. taking them to fight in order
to feed the trench its ghosts. 

tablespoon poem

i have lived my life one tablespoon at a time.
this is about how much you're allowed
to swallow. the birds that come & make nests
in the smallest of places. voles who carve songs 
through dark. i would put the sky
on my tongue just to feel a star flicker.
i buy more tablespoons. i am always afraid
of running out. what would i do if i could
no longer measure how much i'm allowed
to want? sometimes we pass barns & i dream
of owning one. of filling it with hay & laying there.
looking up at a tablespoon-sized hole
in the roof. there, the angels crawl in with their
many eyes & many legs. i can feel things shrinking.
the size of our hands. the size of our gods. 
i pray inside tablespoons. i fight inside tablespoons.
i know that i will die inside a tablespoon. 
when i was a girl i used to eat from the peanut butter jar
just one tablespoon at a time. my tongue.
little prophet. i do not feel like i want very much.
the door with a snake inside. the mailbox
full of wings. i once dug my tablespoon
into cream cheese container & the neck snapped off.
i imagined going in with my hands. 
no spoon. no borders. just the hunger & how
far it would drive me. knees & wood. 
i am most sorry that i often put my love
into a tablespoon. feed it to my darlings 
as if it is enough. i want to believe in abundance
but i have seen a row of houses burn to 
the ground. i have felt my ribs turn 
to feathers. coughed them out. i have dreamed recklessly 
& without release. give me the keys to the moon.
i want to drive it until it fits in the bath 
& then i want to lay there, skin glowing bright.   

bryant park

when it rained, i would sit 
beneath the big park tent 
with all the waiting people.
it was a soup-ladle summer. i loved
being a fleck of dust beneath
the city's shoe. i walked the avenue 
of the americas, trying to save
the few subway dollars it would take
to get me to work. 
my mom used to tell me 
that purgatory was like
waiting outside in the rain. 
on some mornings, this felt true.
i was always looking for a seat
on the parks metal folding chairs.
children with their fists in their mouths.
a man with all his life in two bags
he was sleeping on. then, me, 
trying to connect to the clunky 
park wifi to write a few tired poems. 
on other days though 
the rain made the place feel enchanted.
we were not waiting for anything.
instead, we were thick & full. water washing
the sidewalk & the storefronts. 
i loved when it fell soft. almost 
just a mist. i imagined not 
showing up at the big monster building. 
not stepping across the shining floors. 
getting drenched in the hot rain
with some children who,
free of school, made the park bigger. 
i never let myself do that. instead,
i watched as others did. i wore 
button-up shirts back then &
belts & pants. i was buckled into myself. 
i want to go back on 
a thunderous morning. pretend i am
on my way to feed a dragon again. 
stand on the sleepy grass. get soaked
to the bone, waiting for nothing. 

naming the birds

it is the ugly day. i borrow my mom's shoes
to go out in the yard & plant a tooth 
behind the garage. the old christmas tree
has grow up hold squirrels. its shadow
is that of a broad-shouldered man. the squirrels
are covering their ears. there is only so much
you can write to your government about
before you are talking to no one. before
your words turn into french fries.
quick & needy. i don't try to tell the truth often.
when i do write i say things like, "i believe
in ghosts." the government puts a metronome 
at the end of our driveway. i tried to tell
my lover that we could hide in my parent's house.
here now though i know there is no where
to go. no secret door. no bookshelf that opens
into a golden field. my mom joins me.
we take a walk & i do not tell her about the tooth.
i am no obsessed with legacy but i do want
a part of my body to feel free. the tooth
one day turning into a grinning tree. one that
no one will ever be able to cut down. they will
come for miles to see it. they will not know
it is me. it is the un-killable parts of me.
we see birds & try to guess what they 
are called. we are both story tellers of sorts.
she tells me about birders she's written about
before for the paper. we decide the birds
are barn swallows though neither of us can
confirm if that is true. the birds tell us,
"you can call us anything. just don't call 
us dead." we try other names. "house wren"
& "white-throated sparrow." the birds laugh.
they know that none of the names are correct.
we ask them to guess our names & they say,
"afraid." we stop laughing. go home. i check
on my tree as if it might have grown in the short 
time since we walked. just the grass. 
i am told that change is gradual. that slowly
the world becomes kinder. i guess i believe it can.
but i do not believe anything is gradual. 
i have never witnessed 
a gradual change. i have seen glaciers melt.
i have seen families of trees turned to ash.
my body shape-shift around my hunger. 
it always feels too fast to catch up to. 

cornfield

the corn knows something is wrong
before anyone else. i was ten when the field 
behind our house grew doctors. it was 
just before the world fell apart again.
again again again again. back then,
i was still talking to a hole in the sky. i was
still drowning my hands in the creek 
each afternoon in the hopes that 
they would stop talking. prophecy fatigue. 
stop telling me this is bad, i always thought. 
i can already feel it's gonna be bad. 
nothing stops them though. they pound
on the walls. knock on the windows.
they always wanted to converse with the corn.
i guess that is what they still want. 
i have woken up to find a whole hand 
out their between the stalks. i leave out
a bowl of cream. hope it keep coaxing them home. 
the doctors just stood there. they had
no families & no purpose. they just waited
in white coats. we stopped walking down
the backroad where they would keep
their vigil. my mom would say, "soon"
as if that would smooth over
all the ugly edges. the corn grew eyes.
the corn grew fists. the doctors chattered
& wrote papers about all the sickness. 
they won medals & awards. they had photographers
take their pictures. the corn didn't grow tall
that year. most of it fell over. 
it is always a root-up kind of dying. 
there is something down there. 
a worm with no hands. a mass grave. 
some kind of brilliant wound. when the doctors 
departed it was august. the trees ached.
my house caught fire & we put it out 
with our thumbs. a smoldering little grain.
the doctors left behind their coats.
i remember my brother & i trying them on.
my hands said, "be careful what ghosts
you step inside." i shed the gloves 
& never returned to the field. every once
in a while i will see a piece of clothing left over.
a surgical mask. a boot. 
nothing much has changed. the corn is
still trying to warn us. my hands still talk.
they say, "close your eyes." they are out
of ideas. i do sometimes wonder 
what would have happened if i joined them.
the doctors. if maybe i could have been
taken with them to their holy nowhere.
instead, i am here. the corn is blinking.
my hands say, "do not stop. do not stop." 

february

the onions foretold it's going to be
kind of rough. we didn't know
it was going to snow last night
& now the house is a cold femur.
snow light making the whole house glow.
i consider burning
the wooden spoon. i wonder if
you would notice. in the kitchen
in the morning dark i cut off
my hands. they lay like chayote
on the cutting board. 
they didn't turn into spiders like
i wanted. you asked last night, "what are
we going to do when the firewood
runs out?" i held your face. my fingers,
little cucumbers. i thought of 
the knive chopping them.
summer salad. i told you i am going
to steal the sun. i'm going to yank
it from its perch & then it'll be all ours.
then i was sad that so many of my dreams
involve new thievery. i want 
an unstolen feast. i want to feel 
heat from my ribs to my fingertips.
i thought maybe the spiders
could knit us a thick blanket 
or a ladder to sky. i get a ladle. 
go outside in my morning robe,
blood still dripping from my arms,
& reach to skim the cream off 
the sun. i only manage clouds. spoon in my mouth.
a vole offers to be one of my hands.
i let him. at this point,
i am open to most transformations.
you are still asleep. you are in the process
of becoming a mountain. i bring you 
a cup of coffee. i save you a morsel
of the cream. pluck a tree growing
from your back & brush the white pine needles
onto the floor. let you sleep in a little longer.
set up camp in the lowlands. 
plant my fingers & hope they grow 
a lovely bramble of knuckles
that i can use to knock on all our walls. 

lana del rey 

somethings can actually turn you gay.
it happened to me when i was listening 
to summertime sadness
with my best friend walking 
on the crooked road
to my house, each of us 
with one earbud in. i think it was
the last month of the last month
of high school. we were making all kinds of 
deadly promises. like "i'll be back"
& "i won't forget this." you always 
forget. the world has a way
of pulling curtains. i was never a girl 
but back then i was. 
i found a shadow in her music  
that opened a dormant self. a self
with so much red that i had
to bury it wherever i could. 
we played her songs
over & over. video games &
all his favorite remixes of it. 
back then youtube
wasn't as loud. it was just a little postage stamp
on a letter from an ugly world.
we always parted at the top 
of the hill. sometimes, we'd linger.
green field behind us but this day 
he took the ear bud, his ear bud & parted.
he had something to do & maybe so did i.
the trees grew legs. it rained hard that night
& i kept the album on. opened my window
& allowed the rain to soak the carpet.
i pictured myself with a smooth car
& a sun big enough to hold me.
outside, someone was riding a dirt bike
in a cornfield. summer's elbows.
humid breath. the widening ache. 
you can tell it is going to break
you open. this kind of turning. 
i played the songs again.