Every plant a man has given me
I have killed
though i have loved and tended to
and I have felt the fuzz of a petal between my thumb
meditated on its softness
They sit in their pots
soil caked
tawny crisp edges
drying and dying
while I pour my heart and bloodcut screams
into something else dying from the inside
My ancestors believed that the source of all rivers
is the maw of the ravenous sea monster Cipactli -
part male, part female, part reptile, part amphibian, part fish -
slaughtered by Tezcatlipoca (“Smoking Mirror”), who shaped
its mighty carcass into the green scaffolding of the earth.
My own source is in dispute:
neither fish, nor fowl, nor snake, nor toad,
nor Mexican, nor American, nor heathen, nor pious,
nor here nor there, but always thirsty. A bend.
A meander. A confluence of departures.
For example: one day my father and I went walking along the Danube
(named for Danu, the primordial water, mother of the serpent Vritra,
who imprisoned all the rivers of the world
until it was slain by Indra, King of Heaven).
On the bank, saucer magnolias bloomed a pink so delicate
it was all I could do to not shove the petals in my mouth.
He said we would be leaving Austria forever,
and in my grief I gathered dead beech leaves
in a white envelope, as if I could send home through the mail.
Years later, my mother and I went walking by the mouth of the Patapsco
(which may mean “black water,” “white rocks,” or “tide covered with froth”).
She took me to hear a man who said he could warp the shape of ice crystals,
simply by scrawling curses on jars of water and freezing them.
Snake oil and bullshit, I sneered.
But some time afterward, a Wixáritari magician
anointed my bare chest with spit and ashes,
and he said I should plant a coin and a candle
in the waters of the swift-flowing North Saskatchewan.
And, yearning for a river to flow on, I did.
My ancestors believed that when Chalchiuhtlicue (“She of the Jade Skirt”),
god of baptism and storms, destroyed the Fourth Sun,
she transformed humans into fish so they could survive the coming flood.
Then she broke her water on a red chair, and two babies,
female and male, slithered away from her on that rushing tide.
My father I remember as a coward, for the most part.
But once, on a hill overlooking the Shenandoah
(possibly “River of Swans”), on a day of grey light,
he spotted a man poised to kill a copperhead, and said:
“Mister, if you hit that snake, I will strike you down.”
A century ago, my grandfather left his home in the High Place of the Frogs
and followed the Left-Handed Hummingbird across the desert
until he came to the Place Where the Prickly Pears Grow Among the Rocks,
which floats on the memory of the Place of the Herons,
just below the surface of the Navel of the Moon.
All three places - mythical, ancient, and contemporary -
lie superimposed on each other like acetate transparencies,
nourished by a network of revenant canals
that swirl around an island
where a rattlesnake writhes in an eagle’s mouth.
My ancestors believed that the roots of the Tree of Life
are watered by an underground river
that snakes through black defiles
and carries the fleshless dead
to the nine levels of Mictlān.
I believe that one day I will board a canopied barge
on which the name of my mother is spelled out in flowers,
and I will pass between the bones of abandoned gods,
and I will flow down that ghost stream towards home.
We ask so much of the dead
afraid to ask anything of the living
I think it has to do with listening
people are always too busy
worrying about the past or things
that have yet to pass while the dead
are completely present they won’t
cut you off mid-sentence the dead
don’t give you pressure but space
to make your own decisions the dead
won’t poison you with their opinions
maybe we’d all be better off
dead at least then I’d have
something in common with other
people all hope for human connection
has bled out of me through all the words
that slashed through my self-esteem I, too,
must be a dead thing there’s no way
you can call the life I lead “living” so
I feel most at peace among tombstones
telling all the other corpses my deepest
wishes because being able to speak
freely and be heard
is fulfillment
The water in the sink had gathered swiftly and the tiny whirlpool did nothing to ease Ettie’s nerves. She could still hear the drip...drip...drip taunting her and her aching head as she leaned from the tattered beige couch--a gift from her in-laws--and peeked over at the door.
The key to the front door hadn’t turned yet, and that meant Douglas was still in his office, fussing over a tall stack of papers that belonged to the Wall Street Men of the financial district. The men worked with tricky numbers and wore designer suits and ties with brand names: names that Ettie could never pronounce right.
Ettie knew she was too dull to understand the significance of business lunches, tennis matches in the Hamptons and late-night meetings, so she bought fashion magazines and read the advice columns on how to become the wife that Douglas deserved.
She tried keto diets and went for spa pedicures. The Korean women painted glittery rose flowers on her big toes: designs that swirled as she lifted her long blue bohemian dress and wiggled her toes at Doug.
Her husband wasn't amused and Ettie eventually got bored with her failed attempts at pretending to be posh. One night as the thunder roared above, she wandered about the attic like a lost ghost and stumbled upon her grandmother’s cookbooks. She blew the dust and cobwebs away and began her new hobby--a flame had been ignited.
First she pulled the weeds and tended to a small garden in the backyard, watching with delight as the vegetables grew tall and proud. The smell and feel of the root vegetables and the dirt between her fingers grounded her. She made sweet potato- almond salads, rosemary carrot fries, and brown-sugar glazed candied yam. She loved the smell of corn roasting, and dripping with melted butter, along with the herbs and spices that she blended to make bean dips.
“The smell and feel of the root vegetables and the dirt between her fingers grounded her.”
Ettie smiled when soups began to bubble and her eyes lit up as she watched dark chocolate hazelnut cupcakes fluff up in the oven: she would top them with strawberry icing and rainbow sprinkles and leave them by the windowsill to cool.
Ettie often cooked mostly for herself since Douglas was never home. She would listen to the various sounds of the kitchen and turned up the volume on an old Hitchcok flicks (Rear Window being her favorite).
Besides working late night shifts Douglas was OCD about cooking so Ettie could never be too creative with his meals. It was often one cup of steamed kale, bok-choy and one cup of rice measured to the last grain.
“Ettie...please follow my instructions,” Douglas would say before he left for work. If she didn’t he would throw away the pot and make her cook it all over again.
Drip...drip...drip...
Ettie listened to the stillness of the night and tried to forget about Douglas’ silly instructions and the sink. She counted the spaces between the drips, as a child would with waves crashing over their sandy toes on a tame beach.
The night before it had been the same and the drips disturbed her dream. It had been a good one, filled with red-blue butterflies fluttering over a lush green meadow. When her eyes stirred open, Ettie rolled over and hugged her fluffy pillow, pretending it was her husband until she fell back into the silent emptiness of the four bedroom house.
Ettie’s memory wasn’t clear but she knew she had asked Douglas to look at the sink at least once or twice before he had left.
“I have to go now...” Douglas had said and walked away as his voice trailed off.
When was that?
She couldn’t quite remember.
There were no other sounds, good or bad, just the drip. Ettie took a handful of over the counter night-time relief pills and tried to shut her eyes. Lately, sleep felt like a luxurious vacation on an Island with tiki huts and massages by men whose muscles were kissed daily by the sun.
Ralph, the plumber, visited her early morning one day and clanked away at the sink with his box of metallic tools: clogged up lady--too much rice.
Ettie stopped cooking rice. Between Doug’s obsession with the measurement of the rice, her keto diet, and the dripping sound, it made sense to banish rice from their house. However, the craving for rice remained.
It began as a sharp pain at the bottom of her gut until it gathered saliva in her mouth. There were days that she felt ravenous as she smelled and tasted the phantom texture of it in her mouth.
Ettie used to make vegetable biryani and yellow Mexican rice-arroz con pollo; and she longed for the taste of saffron, for it had been her favorite flavor.
Her grandmother had shown her how to make zeresk polloh, chicken cooked in saffron and barberries, back in Esfahan, Iran. She pictured the Zorostrian gods of ancient days lazing upon lavish Persian gardens and licking the ambrosic vivid crimson thread right off of the crocus.
On one occasion, Douglas brought some of the business men to his home. He had gone over the jokes and proper manners and the menu for the night: stuffed mushroom, baked clams and spaghetti with lobster pomodoro.
Something had awoken in her since she began to cook and Ettie decided to improvise instead. She roasted plump heirloom tomatoes from the Farmer’s market. She sizzled olive oil and water with the tiny sour barberries, mixed and stirred the aromatic basmati rice and simmered the organic chicken. She even made tah-dig-the fried rice that remained at the bottom of the pot.
Everything was perfect: she shampooed the rug, bought a beige tablecloth from a small French boutique store, spread out the silverware and lit vanilla scented candles that perfumed the dining room. The Zeresk polloh: was served that night along with vanilla creme brulee and spiced cardamom black tea.
Everything was perfect.
The Wall Street Men drank the Riesling wine, ate their meals, and laughed boisterously. Ettie smiled and told a few jokes. She took small bites and skipped desert. Douglas nodded, saying very little.
A lovely wife.
You’re a lucky man Douglas.
A very lucky man...
She thought she had heard them say and those words echoed far away somewhere in her memory.
When the men left Ettie twirled towards her husband in her fancy new green gown and let out a delightful laugh--for she had drunk more than she should have.
Douglas grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her close.
She could smell the hard liquor on his breath.
“I told you these men wanted lobster tonight. Lobster-not chicken.”
Ettie was dumbfounded.
“They loved it,” she said in a small voice and Douglas dropped her hand.
“They were being polite...”
“They said you were a lucky man…” Ettie insisted.
“You are delusional.”
Douglas disappeared into the bedroom and a few minutes later, he appeared in front of her with two huge suitcases stuffed with a bulk of his belongings.
“Where are you going?” Ettie asked as tears dripped down her cheek.
“I’m sending Daine to pick up the rest of my things. Don’t follow me,” he said.
The dripping began right after Douglas had left.
It had been a while now...somewhere in her clogged up memory she knew it had been weeks, maybe months since her husband had returned home.
That’s why the sink is still dripping...
Autumn leaves had faded fast, dried up like summer cicadas, and winter had brought on a harsh wind, leaving a wilted grave instead of a robust garden.
Ettie kept looking at the door, imagining the key turning, her twirling towards her husband as Douglas walked through the door--hugging and kissing her-- with those fancy men complimenting her efforts:
A lovely wife.
You’re a lucky man Douglas.
A very lucky man...
Perhaps those words weren’t spoken..
Perhaps they had been.
She couldn’t quite remember.
After Douglas left, Ettie had cooked rice with the last threads of saffron...one last time and when it was done she poured it down the sink.
She went outside to see if the BMW had pulled up: but every night it was the same--Ettie would walk back inside, wrap the Mexican blanket around her body.
She would plop on the couch, lay and listen to the sound:
drip...drip...drip.
still glowing under
the Hollywood sign,
she can feel the stars
surrounding when eyelashes
curl, close lids sinking inside
her perfume scent hypnotizing
rich with sweat, wanting to
feel a touch of her smile
my hand on your cheeks
blushing so wildly
I didn’t want to forget
our barstool conversations
while more than friendly tongues
greet for the first time, mouths
speak when exchanging lipstick
tracers, traded the bar sign neon
for more natural skyline…
the mountains above,
her valleys bellow, the beach
waves keep calling, this town
of lonely exhaust fumes with
two less Angeles, now Lost
within lipstick, unbuttoning inhibitions,
her softest terrain now giggles
undressed flashing Moonlit drives
while Griffith Park car, manicured
hands love exploring her headlights.
kissing soft shoulders, so many
thoughts racing, as she reclines
softly signaling enter… our lips
craves cruising for hours savoring
the view, her one-way traffic
loves causally merging Sunset.