Before the sun turned over
on winter’s soft heaps, you heaved
the door open
and packed white down with each step;
the wind blew
your chin to your chest,
your eyes to your boots,
and then you were
on the ground.
A metal post before you,
a splitting pang on your face, your back
on the ice, cold flurries prickled in-
side of your waistband
and you became your fourteen year old self
who didn’t know
the weight of her body
in his hands.
The wild flowers are tall and reach my waist.
A map is pointing north in two – diverge.
The ink just smears like blood; I will release
crumpled paper into the blue river.
Like God put trees on earth, a tear may drip.
A veil of lavender covers my face,
it trails over the ground in bright sunlight.
The berries ooze into my hands like sweet
honey, the pond has round water lilies.
My hands submerge in crystalline water.
I trace the moon, it’s bigger than my palm.
A waning, holy light of fading hues
like Michelangelo is painting frescoes.
The willow sheds its leaves in branch water,
the birds are chirping, bells that ring in ears.
My eyes are glassy, a rose inside a vase.
The cacti wither away in heaps of soil.
I gaze at twinkling stars in darkened sky,
my skirt is gently carried by the wind.
I remember the awe of last sunrise.
For M.
When did this violet come
to take you away?
It shifts in places we cannot know. As roots below the earth
of gold.
Let me hold you
in water, of water.
Let me wash you
from this coil.
Of suffering, you aspirate all over that yellow light
& white coverlet;
a collapsing. Even the summer broke
to you. How the fight
becomes kingdom. How dark blood
becomes clean once it stops running.
Weep now.
How life is a temperance of tears,
but not now. Now you can water your threshold.
You only have to make one decision:
the salt of the earth
or fire.
You only have to sleep. You choose fire.
You do not have to breath.
Your organs are not chosen.
You go when you are not awake,
we wake when you have gone.
Your skin is free from poison.
In the smallest hours of night
I bend my knees. They take your skin with them.
Of day I lay my head upon the ground.
I crawl from water to land to mourn you.
They give your skin to those who need it.
You are the sound that lasts on and on, pulling
us through its veil.
I think a lot about the dog Winn-Dixie and when he gets peanut butter stuck to the top of his mouth. When the blind lady feeds him in the back of her junk yard, with lemonade, the kind of one she squeezes into a pitcher, and makes sure to tell everyone she did it herself. I think about milk, too, what it takes to be as smooth and thick as milk. I think about milk, how a boy in the morning chugs a carton till the edges fold in and their stomachs, fold, over their waistband, that is mostly gray, sometimes green and plaid. I think about doctor’s rooms white lounge chairs, that squeak on paper and tear triangles in it, when you move. I think about weight, how I hover in front of the number so mama won’t see. I think about getting my blood taken, lots of sundays, after eating a banana besides the bottom- how sunday’s blood work feels like being on the doctor’s scale, and closing my eyes until she’s done. I think about sunday mass at 12:15, slouched like vanilla pudding in the pew. Pushing little lego men into my bear-like stomach so my sisters would watch them pop up in the air, like bungee cords. I think about when mama got mad at me for making a ruckus in church, and I laughed mostly then, because we weren’t supposed to.
I think about the boy I love, how he stutters over things that come straight from the ground. The dirt- honey, from a bee’s stinger. I think about how he’s dumbfounded by hollowed out peach pits if they’re not netted in sugarcane. I think about how he’s dumbfounded by densities- squash, and eggplant, that are heavy and light and medium, and why that is, and why that’s not. I think about what it’s like to have thin blonde hair, like the dog Winn-Dixie, instead of being milk, that bounces lego’s off it’s core, heavy and scared. I think about how the boy I love is dumbfounded by the weight of vegetables, like squash, or a carton. How he dreams of little Winn-Dixie's, that have the sweetest peach pits in the world. Like all us women’s peach pits should.
I’m just musing out loud
but I think in a past life we were once really happy
and maybe this was all a temporary glitch
but on this plane
and in this lifetime
it’s like catching fireflies
and I cannot continue to be a fragile paper doll for you.
so I hope all your colors come back
and your weary soul finally finds a home
that is not bound to mine.