I put Billie on
& mixed two margaritas;
got on my knees &
called Jesus over.
He smiled at my nature;
I grinned at His words.
He looked puzzled when
I asked why He abandoned
me so long ago.
"My child," He blushed,
"I never left you; I went
only to get a
sour slice of lime
for my margarita glass.
You never needed
me -- you were always
the one who wanted to be
her own religion."
� � �
"Memory"
2004
when I was a small
girl, living on a tiny
island, I would watch
freight barges at night
as they hauled coal up & down
the Mississippi.
� � �
"Grandpa's Breakfast"
2004
i made pancakes at
the dark hour of midnight
because that is when
my grandpa used to
make them for me on the nights
i woke him for work.
� � �
"Choirboys"
2004
god has seen them in
ford's and chevy pick-up trucks,
steamy windows with
fingers between thighs,
hands fondling young teenaged breasts,
tongues dancing with tongues.
� � �
"He Haunts Me Still"
2004
sometimes i wake with
a rapid heart in my chest,
ghastly images
in my head, cold on
my skin; lingering smells of
his cigarette breath
� � �
"Our First Night"
2004
my hands adore you
fingers crawling like s
pid
ers
through
your
hair
tongues on flesh & f e a r subsides
we write our
kama
sutra on each other's skin
gods are evoked as our bodies move in
r
h
y
t
h
m
flames dance in witness
as toes curl &
breath becomes one
� � �
"Your Poetry"
(for I.)
2004
i lay naked on the bed:
messy sheets, sultry air.
you on the other side of the room --
nude you sit with pen in hand, paper on lap.
you look at me and smirk,
scribbling another verse.
"what's it read?" i ask.
you smile coyly, indicating that
you will not tell me, but show me.
you rise from your chair and approach me.
(god made no mistake when he made you.)
you run your ink-stained fingers down my body:
� � �
"Panties, Daisies and Mud"
2005
scream into her.
pull her hair and call her names:
BITCH! WHORE! SLUT!
-- this is what you make her.
on the bed, white walls, messy floor.
� � �
"The Rape of Me"
2005
summer dreams
become
winter cries
become
delicate breasts
� � �
"Daddy's Suicide"
a true story
2005
I was a fetus in Mamma's belly when Daddy took a shotgun to his head.
� � �
"'Tis Who We Are"
(for R.)
2005
Sylvia and Anne:
The oven and the garage,
The light and the dark
Chain smoking in the shadows:
The light-haired versifier,
The dark-haired bard
With cigarettes and whiskey,
Writing our mad girl's love song:
Wild, wild women
� � �
"Mother"
(for M.)
2005
Mother,
we have the same hands,
but there is an abyss,
so deep,
between us
that I cannot touch you.
my fingers claw at the empty air
that sits between us,
still and stagnant, the smell burns my nose.
I can scarcely see your shadow
walking away from me.
it is hard for me to understand
how a mother could walk away from her daughter.
perhaps it was me who walked away when there was still so much to say; --
Mother,
tell me just once
that you love me for who I am,
not what plagues my skin.
these are my battle scars, you see, from
battles that were fought during silent screams.
a man's hands around my neck,
my wounds integrating with his:
I let the dirt clog my pores.
I could only bleed my relief.
but it matters not, however,
where they came from
or for what reason;
you can only blame yourself for being a rotten mother; --
� � �
"The Almost Biography of Brin Anjelika Kovak"
2005
She used to smoke in the bath tub,
she told me once,
but put a stop to that ritual
after an incident with gravity
and the ashtray
left her bathing in gray water
with soggy Marlboro butts
and soap suds.
� � �
"Untitled"
2005
Mother, you monster,
I watch you squirm under your uncertainty of me.
Sinister nostalgia overcomes when I light a cigarette,
when I starve myself for a day.
I sneak into your bed and smell your sheets;
scents of you lingering on my tongue.
You do not see my starving bones.
You taught me to bite my tongue,
to not speak of the ailments in my head.
Spit amniotic fluid into my eyes,
blind me with your love,
poison me with family blood.
Mother, can you see me now? --
I'm like you somehow.
I'll make myself nothing to express what you have given me.
� � �
"Only the River Saw"
2005
breath lingers
over a sad woman:
she's a porcelain champagne prisoner.
she remembers that evening
like you remember what you wore
on 22 November, 1963
or on 11 September, 2001.
it wasn't a national tragedy,
only her own.
she claws for redemption, but
only the river saw
the sky is broken
and night has no rhythm.
every life tastes god
at least once.
the flowers didn't smell the same
on Dachau's lawn
after the Liberation.
he called her delicious meat,
and she felt like meat.
she incubates that day, but
only the river saw