Before my family began,
a star threading DNA
through her burning arms.
Five point kindergarten star,
the classic.
In a sea of guanine,
boats bobbing in the storm,
future dismayed joints.
Among the blooming cytosine,
dysfunctional minds floating
like pollen
then collapsing into solidity.
The voices of pre-dead women.
My sight unsewn.
This star will explode.
Children mature
the way multitudes desire,
turning from proud stones
to sand.
The machines take turns
walking me.
I’ve been ill with
wicker baskets for weeks.
Between my legs,
unzipped zipper.
Epiphany window.
When I was pregnant,
I lived wretched
as a butterfly in glass.
After birth,
I became a flower.
My stone
makes my reliquary
when she naps.
Far away,
mortars,
pestles,
beaches.
I will hide her in
the hungry mountains.
My shoes are made of china,
the white and blue decorating
my spectral feet
like moon shadows.
Everywhere I have ever walked
has been coated in bone or glass.
I avoid mirrors.
They show me all my thoroughfares,
and all but one are cruel.
The last is frightened.
Little by little,
my feet bleed.
The friendship between
nail and noose is
careful, refined.
Outside the pharmacy,
a pale and rain-soaked line.
What I know in my head
I do not know in my wrists
that hide a way of love.
The tree is held up by a cable
wrapped around Gabe’s hand
at the other end.
On the tree,
a sign nailed in
“Welcome.”
Tall meagerness
looms above my cold day.
Greatly desired ghosts
refuse to descend from the trees.
While vegetables sleep in
the earth,
hunger tugs at them gently
trying to lead them to birth.
I feel empathy.
So little to see.
So little to say.
The height of my soul
An inch above sea level.
Above me,
a lack.
Kindred cartwheels
spread like a virus
from child to child.
The cotton candy machine
spins discarded hair
like it was cotton.
The children are always awed
by the taste
of old age on their tongues.
Behind the tent,
parents time stamp
the infants
and tattoo names on each other.
Little rollercoasters
struggle for an
adolescent speed.
Childhood is a charlatan
I have eaten all the
red lollipops there are to lick,
and my face is permanently stained.
I am a constant victim of curiosity.
Free time flies away
on a paper airplane.
I left my wherewithal
in a cubby.
No one ever told me
just take three licks.
Take your licks now.
God filtered through rain,
six color promise.
The sun he forged
burning my toast from
the immunized difference
between us.
My promises are colorful too.
Purple promise to my husband,
to love the landscape of
his judgments.
Red promise to absorb his kisses,
squeeze mine out on his
body like a lotion.
Yellow promise of waiting
for him in the gaps.
Intricately,
the neighbor paints the windows
with the image of his bare chest,
feral abs,
face that cleans itself.
His wife will come through
the white front door
with a basket of
feline flowers.
Like lace
they will crisscross.
and I will close the blinds.
The tree wears a brace.
Summer is only half southern.
Among the roses
atoms splitting.
I reach through torn air.
Past it –
a gummy planet.
My life will live on
without me.
Hair and schedules
are only shells.
Nothing stands well
against the climate
of persnickety evil.
The tree’s chi sinks into
its roots.
The roses,
meanwhile,
fire their hopeful signals
at random.
Miniature Moon 