Poetry

We are Married and

Now we are the same height.  He pronounced us married and we kissed and now we are the same height.  That kiss weaved our mouths into a marriage blanket; and on rainy days, we’ll make a tent in our living room.  My toothache is your decaying molar.  The left side throbbing—we’ll hold our cheeks, moaning in unison.

We danced our first married dance and now we no longer have to speak. My mind is full of your thoughts; your thoughts echo in my mind.  The words start in my throat, but it’s your mouth that delicately forms the sounds. Your lips moving, my tongue pressing against our teeth saying, “I do, I do.”

We cut the velvet cake and our mouths devoured the same piece.  Your hunger is my stomach growling.  I need to feed you so I don’t starve.  We are married and the mirrors are always foggy.  Your foot is my foot and our shoes are all the same size.       

In our honeymoon bed, my arms hug my body and your legs wrap around your ankles.  We are contortionists—pretzeled and joined in matrimony.

We are married and we are one and we are married and I am

 

Ghazal

For R.G.

 

Now there are trees, and beneath our feet, there is a path.

Striking white, phantom orchids bloom.  Flowers meet the path.

 

You are left waiting, I am left waiting, no one joins.

Would you follow me along an unfamiliar path?

 

Now the years have left her, now the years have saddened her.

In an old photograph, she walks alone down a path.

 

Weights and scales, mortar and pestle, jars and bottles—

the apothecary’s garden grows along the path.

 

Elizabeth feels contrived, Macrae feels...

Where do I fit? Where will it lead? Should I take this path?

 

Some People

see visions in a burnt piece of toast,

some in the face of a woman.

 It’s like watching your parent’s from the top of the stairs—

Your mother’s forehead crease, her lips a stiff line;

You can hear your father’s voice but not his words.

You wonder if they can feel your presence like arm hairs standing.

Some people like to sit in the front of roller coasters,

some like to see what’s ahead

It’s like watching your parent’s from the top of the stairs—

You can see your mother rubbing her necklace;

You can see your father open and closing his fists.

You don’t like sitting in the front; don’t like seeing the horizon—

the track vanishing before the fall.

When I was Eight, My Sister Turned Inside Out

it wasn’t as if she unzipped her spine

stepped out of her skin

meticulously worked the folds of her joints

smoothed the creases of her breasts

to play dress up

it wasn’t as if she opened her mouth wide

stuck her arm down her throat

reached for her stomach

played tug-of-war with her intestines

until she was a pile of organs

her bones unveiled

susceptible

no

it wasn’t anything like that

it was worse

her pink cheeks faded

until she was paper-yellow skin

her face sinking into what used

to be her eyes

every expression the same color

there was always blood

in our washcloths

her lungs exhausted

her body draining itself

nurses invaded her veins

with sterile needles

pierced her skin raw

injected poisons

week after week

her body wanted to reverse so badly

it rejected her strawberry-blonde hair

left clumps on pillows

in shower drains

until her head was bare

smooth as the day she was born

the last time I saw my sister

she was under a sheet

thicker than her skin

only ribs and hipbones outlined

her body plugged into the hospital

robot lungs

machine pumped heart

liquid food in tubes

bags changed nightly

her lips so dry

I was afraid if I kissed them

they would crumble

into dust

There Are No Second Chances

After “A Moment in Troy” by Wislawa Szymborska

Little girls—

strong, defined

by their deliberate and practiced motions.

Delicate eyes focused forward,

guided only by the preceding ponytail.

Each resembles the other

in similarities and differences

distinguished only by abstract

reflections of practice and precision.

Little girls—

walk in straight, deliberate lines

walk with straight, deliberate shoulders

stopping in formation, like soldiers.

Elegance and grace join powerful

sinuous movements.

Little girls—

locked in translucent boxes,

perform and become nothing

more than identical silhouettes

fighting for recognition.

Each apparatus becomes its own battle.

Here a stutter-step means devastation,

here a miscalculation equals defeat.

Did you know ambition never rests?

Little girls—

made of silk and stone.

Bait

I.

my husband gets home

walks straight to the fish tank

traces the words

I love you I love you

onto the glass

the goldfish follows                                                                

his fingertips

day after day

like bait

II.

the multicolored

flecks float on the surface

as if declaring

I am here, devour me

to the goldfish

a few pieces sink

to the rock-filled bottom

the colors evaporating

as they fall

III.

I massage my hands

along his neck and spine

pressing my name

Macrae Macrae Macrae

into his skin

the letters vanish

beneath my fingertips

as I write them

 

The Sky was Falling

And we were standing beneath that turquoise umbrella, barely fitting because we didn’t like when our shoulders touched.  I was crying and you were laughing (because that’s your version of sentiment).  It was raining so hard the umbrella was collapsing.  “You take it, I can run home,” you said, but I felt like leaving, so I kissed you on the cheek, even though I knew it would burn my lips.  Your skin seared my lips and they blistered, but I ran fast, faster than I should have been able to.  “I regret you,” is what I thought you said.  But the sky was loud, crashing around me.

 

Drowning the Sun

After I chug all the red wine, straight from the bottle, I pull the sun towards me in an awkward embrace that is both passionate and tender, but the sun hates being touched so he pushes me away and says, “don’t ever do that again without my permission,” and so I apologize before pulling the sun into the ocean and holding him beneath the water’s surface.  The sun fights against me and then struggles against me, but I let him up after a while.  He stomps away into the night muttering to the moon to watch out for the angry drunk.  And then I shout to both the moon and the sun, “I’m not usually like this.  I’m not like this.”

First Apartment

there were only biscuits

the kind you peel

and bang against the counter

there was only coffee

the strong french roast

that kept us conscious

there were always dirty

dishes

dust

ants in the carpet

there was only us

and it wasn’t even the us

we remembered

Tonight We are Noir Heroes

Clichéd and twenty-something

We are scared existentialists

High off unemployment and the extra

hundred Aunt Betty slipped in my graduation card

It’s two-for-ones at the local dive so we swallow 

Dig for forgotten pills in our purses

Searching the bathroom mirror for faces

Lively. Content. Not

this.

We are kindred spirits by dawn

Swearing friendship for always

Drunk off dollar menu tacos

We exist in the moment rather than the splash back

“Hooligans” a lady mutters as she smells us

The night, our world, we simply refuse to let go—

The sun is brilliant, aching above.

Sailing Sideways

 I sat beside my neighbor in the mouth of a yellow tunnel slide when we decided to smoke the joint his brother gave us.

We’d been coming to the park behind our cul-de-sac for years, but this summer we

were allowed to come alone and stay until after the streetlights buzzed and flickered

            to life—it was this little bit of freedom

that got us into trouble.  He pulled the joint out of his front pocket and held it between

 his thumb and pointer finger.

He rolled it between his fingers and pressed it to his nose like his brother had shown