Let me be the ink stain
on the corner left dimple From where the pen bled, and your smile leaked words so quickly, you kept bleeding- until the pen dried up and your creation was a skeleton: like you. Long torso, with arms that make liters look like soup cans and water taste like mother’s milk: Nourish me. Let me nourish you, with a hope that hibernates in the wrinkles on my tear-stained toes and feed you with a spoon made of tulips and thyme. Let me be the way you wish to go on the map that I will draw for you with tattered pages from the book Moses stole from god. For it is in the subtext of each commandment that thou shall not abandon those who make you their home. Let me roll up, both your legs, the invisible fraying. Let me nest you in a hide-away made of stars and sunrise, nestle you between the pieces of Ursa Minor so you will always find your way. thou shall not abandon those who make you their home Let me remember the night mother ran away, with blue watercolors framing her broken eyes, to be back by morning, painting her mask with a normalcy saved for rainbow reflections and the solitude of dust bunnies. Let every knock-knee bend to the floor, as daughters worry that their loves won’t ever return to the beds they made three-times over--as if fitted sheets are the reason it's three AM and he's still not home. Let my fingers envelop yours when miles fold like vanilla and cream and hands are spatulas softly watching worlds collide. thou shall not abandon those who make you their home.
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Unhappiness is a genetic
trait, passed down amongst the women in my family. For as long as I can remember, Misery’s hid in the crooks of our eyes. Where our tears were taught never to fall. Our eyelashes learned to be strong: hold things keep our eyes open. What happens next is So, I’m sorry, if you wanted to love a whole person. Two hands that divvy responsibilities, two feet, on soda cans, balancing the weight so neither gets too heavy. I'm made with one of each taught only to extend. But I can string together what sounds like a prayer, for a Friday night Kiddush though neither of us will know what we’re saying. I am a pauper because you think talk is cheap. I can only string words together: backwards hearts and upside down squares. It’s like us, geometry: it looks right—but it’s not. And I’ve thought of about a thousand ways to tell you that. But infinity is the opposite of definitive and our thumbprints are so unique that we could try to match them up forever but they will never be the same. I would rather not blame the people who built me but I am a flawed machine. My tears are blood, my spit is blood, the way you pronounce my name as you fall asleep is blood. The proud I cannot make you is blood. And I am unhappy. But right now you'd be filling car tires
with faulty memories. Hot air that would peter out before the highway. People get stranded by lies like that. There are no words
that come after goodbye and I am afraid of the silence. (3)
She gazed at me expectantly water boiling in her eyes instead of one baby, they’ll be three. A soft hand on her belly tender look, simple disguise she gazed at me expectantly and asked if I was happy. After countless pregnant-tries, instead of one baby, three. I’d dreamed of a big family but nothing quite like this surprise when she gazed at me expectantly, I wondered if there’d be room for me in a home of warm disguise, instead of one baby, three She gazed at me expectantly, instead of one baby, they’ll be three. What Water Destroyed
four bath towels we stole from le parker meridien on your twenty-sixth birthday when we were the only ones with pool access. a bath mat I bought online that says 'clean' on one side and 'dirty' on the other. It's all dirty, now. two new toothbrushes a pair of socks you forgot an old note i left on the mirror, 'i love you so, handsome.' He said a group of kites is called a mockery laughing at the way I chase my string through Central Park on our staycation. The little boy whose Spiderman kite resembles mine but fits in his tiny hands so that the string bounces off his lifeline and across the picnic blankets. We grabbed the sheets off our bed, soiled in soil, before laundry day. Speaking only in British accents like we could be other people. How I Clean Our Room:
Your things first. They cover the floor. Dirty socks and pennies. The copper change goes in a mason jar labelled 'Fun Monies.' They'll add up to something some day. The dirty socks go into your maroon hamper. I fold the shirts you can wear again, refold my shirts in the dresser under yours. Restoring order. The last time I did something
for the first time it was you. And the shock of being a person who still had firsts sounded like the end of a sentence with the typewriter's first ding! As if, screaming "I'm new to all this." Please be patient with me. My great aunt's pearls
are too long around my neck, bouncing off my clavicle like tiny semi-circle promises. If I wear them loose expectations choke me as if the pearls were too tight like a fashion statement. At the first garden party where we decided to dress like flappers, you let me dance around you until my feet turned blue like the oxygen was gone, even in the middle of the garden, where everything was budding but heavy around my neck. |
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