my mother rises from her deathbed
her face crawls up my throat
until i cannot help but be
inside her mouth. she speaks
me sour, she speaks me clean.
this one who does not leave
me with my womanhood,
this one who sits me down in her womb
and wants to make me stay,
she is the dark skin
i peer through,
beautiful as dark knees
bent in this prayer, this one
this one who digs her way out
to me, as if she wanted
something back.
The afternoon is polite
The dogs cruel A woman plants
my name in her bone
but will not tell me
when rain is coming
In the park children take what’s theirs
from the earth, their laughter like a chain
of wedding dresses I fear the tenderness
Days, she wore me
slung over her
ribs / like a rag
She lifted the limbs of a mountain
& the flowers
tapered
like tiny black dresses
Important to tell her
how the wind makes headstones from ripples
in the lake The dogs bob in & out
like taxis
People spend all day choosing
their gods
Lottery
“It isn’t fair,” she said. A stone hit her on the side of the head.
–Shirley Jackson, “The Lottery”
if the birds were not black
crickets upon
further inspection,
I would wake for the scent
of pine trees.
if the choice were not
always between mercy
or forgiveness,
laundry would dry
completely. if the body was
more than wood jarred
in brine,
the moon would stay
isosceles. if I could diagram
the grammar of a motive,
I could empty
this shoebox. if geometry
were no longer
in the arc but the meter,
i would pray to this round shape
i’ve locked
in my hands.
if the lilies were not
bearing their stamens
like wolves,
is this the only way to be
happy?
