The four poems below are part of my senior project collection Mythomaniac which I’ll have finished in May. I have completely neglected this whole blogging business for quite some time, but I’m back and will be posting the poems from my project as they become somewhat finished.
Hoorahs
Enjoy!
She’s been holding
a secret to the ground, we heard
it knocking in the night. At daybreak
she demands pails of water,
plates of meat, then our absence.
Strong through she is, her secret
sweats her. From view
we vanish, a sea of thin
colorless smiles. She has shaved
us, we are spotted
with blood. Our snarl we save
for each other: lick your own
wounds. But our language is leaving.
If she swings a bag of black
lips, our metronomic eyes
follow. In sleep our memory
uncurls: if we give her a drop
to drink it can’t be long before
her tongue begins to wag.
Day breaks us
and we’re no longer
certain. For stale bones we seize
each other’s throats. For the traitor
will we ever stop crawling?
Begin with crow-bone
moon: a stage for it.
[Enter girl in mouse mask]
Then hook her like mouse.
Plasma play: redless blood. The prey of it.
[Exit mask]
Blush her bloodless
cheeks. Blind the grey of it.
[She attempts to exit. Do not let her leave]
Smile a cheekless grip-
spit smile: she’ll obey for it.
[She kneels]
Touch of tongue shuts off
a light. Gripless, she wanes with it.
[Lights directed at girl extinguish one by one]
While she sleeps, clip her
tongueless. That’s the game of it.
[Do not let her leave]
Strip her sleepless, thin-
cold, then blame for it.
[Leave her]
the shame of it.
[]
Be advised: I know
you’re there. Though hidden
well, your taste for meat bleeds
through. The eyes.
Pigeons plucked and prepared
to your liking. Naked and young:
the deer: a mirror-eyed child wanting
only to please (you) scraped her body
to skin scrap and blood. Your
eyes delighted as hers
whitened. In the orchard apples are
shrinking. Aphids double, double,
then drop. In the orchard
the sun won’t turn. You
are spoiling. The meat
inside you: already spoiled.
You still have the knife,
though you promised it gone.
You have the knives,
be advised: I know.
What wolf wants, you need
not ask. Grave: grass—
grey with dew like fur, and trees
grown twisted: which way are they
turning? Road swallowed by east
hills, splits west through
fog. Oh, do you hear that? Quiet.
The bone yard moons. We follow
the trees: which way are they turning?
Tallest pines lure the dark
closer. And closer, underfoot:
leaves nearly done with being
leaves. Oh! Quiet. We
smell meat don’t we, friend?
Here: roots: toward what do they
lengthen? Oh,
we know what lingers,
earth wolf, below the structured
stones. We smell it,
don’t we? They put it down
there: we grow
hungry. Oh, we grow
hungry and we dig.
I wrote this poem today, I’m not sure if it’s finished yet and I’m sure I’ll have plenty of revisions to come but I’ll still share it in it’s present state.
Wholly weed-choked and asleep
like feet, so much
for repainting the wreck.
I’m again all arm or
armor, a sliver of silver is all
you’d need to bite. I burned
my shelves so they wouldn’t look
empty when I gave away my glass.
It’s not the stream that dreads
draught. Dirt blames
dirt for thirst. If a hinge creaks
I may remove the door.
This song is a very sticky one! It makes you go to YouTube to watch the thing, but go GO!
Loves.
Today I’m going to the Russian River with Lucia and Emiko, friends that have stuck around since third and second grade. We meant to get an absurdly early start and leave at six but somehow Lucia and I managed to sleep through the most obnoxious alarm in the world- it plays bird sounds and basically is a lovely combination of high pitch screeches. We’ve got a picnic, with an assortment of who knows what because we went shopping when I was super hungry… I know there are cookies and pickles. Last night I slept on the dog bed squished in between two very deep sleeping dogs. They’re pretty decent cuddlers. New goal was to leave five minutes ago, so goodbye!
Love.
Despite my feeling like a twenty-year OLD lady with this ridiculous cough that seems to keep coming back, I’m going to head over to Oakland soon. I’m meeting up with one of my oldest friends, Emiko, and going to Art Murmur. If all goes well and my little old knees hold out, we’re also going to The Best of the East Bay party, a supposedly huge performing and visual arts party. The sun is very shiny outside, but I’ve been in all day staring at this computer screen, the biggest downside of my internship here at Cleis. This is what publishing entails, though. The idea of the job is awesome, putting books together from start to finish- from reading the manuscripts to marketing the finished copies, finding contacts, contacting contacts, YES! But then there’s the reality of sitting in an office chair, slouching more every hour…
A bit more work to do, then I’m off!
Have a lovely day !
I don’t spend much time watching YouTube videos, but this one makes me giggle. It’s a sparkling blue San Francisco day, so I’m heading to the beach. Enjoy!
