a girl is a paper bag
container for provisions
you fill her with what feeds you
a girl is empty
a girl rips
holding the weight of your
cravings
note: a girl is not a child
children belong to god
a girl belongs to everyone
note: a girl is not a woman
women belong to themselves
a girl belongs to the tongue that summons her
a girl is a conjuring
a girl is a beach ball
a girl works for tips
a girl is a pay phone
how many metaphors do I need to write before you understand
I am not a girl
this is why you pray for a long life
god willing
in order to live days like these:
you hold me as I sleep
although the sun is high
and beckons you to other biddings
you stay
and other days of course:
you with your grandiose missives
and I with mine
high and mighty with
purpose - for a time -
as we stride and strive
towards that which seems
oh so important
and probably is
but more for days like these:
whether you take my hand into waking
with coffee and a poem
or kiss me back to sleep, mercy
you are by my side
god willing
you are why I pray for a long life
hospital coffee is an atrocity.
a shame really usually
in this strip mall death cult we call home the issue
is not
staying caffeinated the issue
is bodies
how they fail
are replaced
bodies we love bodies
we disdain bodies we
never knew but
insistent in their absence
in hospital I drink in contempt
I wait for a body loved not
yet surrendered
my mind wanders to the river
the turtles returning of late
who will be my substitution?
displaced to the city dirty
dues paid I am
in the replacement
stick to the diet sodas
swap some blood for formaldehyde
the difference between
bodies loved disdained
fades beneath the fluorescents
I speak now
to the God of wet moss on rocks
to the Lord of speckled lichens
and fungal blooms
Shy One, teach me Your name
my ancestors did not appoint one for You
because You were quiet
omnipresent
easy to forget
in these days, here
we have finally come to sense Your presence
because You are on the run
Your arrivals
and absences
have tuned us
to Your holy ways
Oh Great Teacher
You are the first to leave
when the air becomes choked
with the poison of wicked men
and the antipathy of all other lungs
to scarred to care
and You, Wise One
are the first to return
after disaster
and death
after destruction has stolen
all hope
from hearts trembling in exile
the first to leave at the scent of corruption
and the first to arrive at the scene of despair
I can think of no greater God
to worship in these
here days
no use laying down salt
when ghosts live
inside the body
can no more protect
lungs from heart
than can contain
ravaging spirits
from wild hunt within
I am
the territory
what hungry death resides
better to lay salt
across threshold
so neither I nor my ghosts
may pass
bidden and biting
into ignorant daylight
the blueberries are good for
January, I'll admit
piled on your plate watching
with baited breath pancakes
as a form of prayer
I did drag you out of bed for this mass
didn't I
as if scrambled eggs
could make any difference
I am wrong to mock breakfast
as salvation on this morning
of the third day you
rose again proclaimed the gospel
I remember there is warmth in the world
asking
again this time not
for another plate of communion
but for methadone.
I would have brought you the moon if you had asked.
