~*~
hanger
there was one summer
in georgia
all of june spent
pulling bodies
out of the bayou
women’s bodies melted
into mud for who knew how long and
would have stayed there if they had not been disturbed
by fishing rods or curious fish or strange stirrings underneath
the water their own restless spirits women found every day floating caught below washed onto shore it was that summer in georgia when we named the bayou women’s lament because every day there was another body to identify every day we lost a daughter
~*~
History
How do we control the symbolism of our actions?
Where for one woman, strength
and war. Where for another, loss
and war.
We thought: maybe we can understand history
without judgment. Maybe
this is possible.
But to understand history without judgment
is to not have history.
So we thought: maybe
we could not have
history.
We tried, not just to forget
but to unlearn. And we discovered
we cannot write
ourselves out of a past.
When we learn,
we are forgetting.
When we forget
we are learning
what matters.
So what does it mean
when women would rather be
killed
than raped
and what does it do
to write that down
who do we condemn
or misunderstand
to get to this point
~*~
Ownership is as ownership is possible:
the breadbox the playclothes the oven warming
the home the nothome (then who owns?) the athome
the street, and when we walk down
who owns the street when we walk down
who crosses the street you
or me
~*~
The Halloween Poems
I. Being Marilyn
Peeled-off eyelashes,
clumped centipede legs
on your nightstand,
that ivory guard
of wakefulness.
Peach pearl body
fragrant-lipped
étude in female,
I wash over,
like you
are not
there.
II. Being Scarlett
No
I will
not
but for home
and land,
taffeta
and whiskey.
Which name,
mine,
or love,
yours?
III. Being Audrey
Popsicle
in a black shift
dress?
~*~
the pregnancy poems, 3
Heart, On
I wanted fearless—
girl
against winter.
Instead, I grew fear like tulips.
Anatomy
Beneath the silk-black belly,
cold brass pedals, their
discarded socks,
muffled echo
of dampers
on hammers,
the piano
anatomy
a whale
enveloping.
On the Subway
The woman next to me is wearing
too much perfume and I am judging
everyone by their shoes because I can’t
look up.
Opening and opening
a fermata
on a single note.
blood
so we were having sex it was going great
something tore on his hand we saw blood we
looked down we stopped he was scared
then he thought wash the sheets I watched him
I said you’re not doing it right I’ll do it you don’t
know the right way to wash blood out of sheets he
said you know the right way to wash blood out of
sheets I thought all women know the right way
to wash blood out of sheets
Waiting for the Bus
Umbrellas open
facing west
~*~