The Island

We made our way
To the nightly resting place
Ready to be washed out to sea
You slept quickly with your head cocked
And your mouth slightly open
Like you had both a question and an answer for the night
I found my way to your valley of bones
And rested in you
Down where we are both cave dwellers
Where I make my fingers into your ribs
And you are still
And breathing like a volcano
I know the canaries have flown away
Leaving us in the silence of our own vines
Resting down in the very bottom
I can smell our mossy sleep
And I’m ready for the nightly voyage

Rowe Street

I remember the house we lived in for 8 months
I remember it furnished with the AC humming
I remember it as it was just before we left
All of us on a mattress on the floor watching TV
With the windows open
And life outside so loud it burst from the green, wet ground

I remember the house we lived in for one year
It was small and didn’t have many windows
In the winter we were barricaded in with snow
Like we lived in an igloo with bunk beds and in-floor heating
I remember summer there was breezy and pale yellow
We could have fires outside and you both wore goggles to keep the smoke out

I remember the house we lived in for two years
It was off balance
A tiny upstairs with a huge garage and a giant, carpeted basement
The floors upstairs were wood and we had bright green curtains on the window
I snuck outside and smoked by the side of the house after you were in bed
I felt my thoughts traveled upwards that way

I remember the house we lived in for 6 months
It was a townhouse
But we had our own little green backyard
It was small and I liked the layout
We had a light blue blanket hanging over the patio doors because it got so hot
I painted your bedroom three colors because I wanted you to be surrounded by brightness

I remember the walls in places
And how we fought between them
How we struggled to live with each other
I remember the way we always ended exhausted
With our hearts inside out
We couldn’t hold tight enough

We loved to check on you at night when all was quiet
And each house hummed its own song
You slept like a sea after a raging storm
With damp hair that smelled like summer
I felt like we have always known each other from every beginning
And no walls could contain my gratitude

1998

She was lulled
By the lawnmowers outside
The lawnmowing fathers
And the lawnmowing sons
The damp green smell
And the easy sun
It evened the score
Between the clock and her heartbeat
Downstairs the radio was on
There was a fan by the front door
Someone was humming
The woman pulled glasses down from the cupboard
And threw them on the floor
When the young sleepwalker came down the stairs
There was a carpet of broken glass
And the woman hummed
Until she drowned out the lawnmowers
She picked up two fat pieces of glass
And wore them as glasses
I see you
The pajama doll went back upstairs
And curled up until her skin was flannel
The clouds became a part of her feet and her hair
She was growing an iron tooth
At the center of her weight
Five vinegar rivers washed into the room
And there were footsteps on the stairs
A pipe burst in the closet
Fresh from the center of the earth
The grass was all cut now - Even steven
And the only sound left was the crunch
Of something underfoot

Waiting for the bus

It’s hard for me
To see you go off and become tall like a tree
At night when you lay rumpled next to me in sleep
You always reach over instinctively to make sure that I’m there
And I have a vision that I am greater than I am
And you see it
Your hands are so small
And expansive
The world grew bigger when I saw them
Your playdough hands
Hide within mine like baby birds
I can’t push you away
With your eyebrows knit
I can’t toss you in with the careless and the agitated
I know you are truly love
We’ve had day after day of side by side excursions
You pick out the bananas
Now get us a good tomato
No, no don’t do that
I try to see the world as you do
And there are colors and new faces
There are times when you twist away from me and I get angry
I try to tame you but you are wild and I am too
You know the spot on the back of my neck where my patience ends and you like to see how far things will go
There are other times when you climb inside my skin and I need to get away and be only one person
But let's be within reach
Because my soul dances when you say hi mom
That’s who I am
I am the mom in the moon
Your satellite
And I will swaddle you with my certainty until you are old
When your voice came up from the ground in the tiniest leaf
I sat down and watched the vines grow into sentences covered in dewdrops
Budding
I feel these words are deep within all of us
But nobody is listening except me and you
And I need to you to stay that way
I need you to bud and flower and always tell me what you see
And I am a little bit lost when the doors open and you look back
It’s hard for me
To see you go off and become tall like a tree

Fever

And you danced like an indigo star tripper
Like a midnight volume teaser
That twists the stems off cherry men
Blowing silent kisses from an eyelash blink
Jeweled hips moving across valleys
Incense and envy soaked into your skin
Smoke rises and moves within
I wish for the smell of your opium hair
We can blossom as the moon opens the night
I’ll catch the diamonds that tumble from your lips
Don’t be wry in the depths of my green eyes
Unrest will find me in a bamboo illusion
Weaving moonbeams into a bed for a sapphire child
Although
Monkeys call us back to the origin of trees
Where began green
Into sun-worshippers that never rest
Never like I metabolize hope
For something like you
Earth queen made of the palm’s desire
Bringing thunder to the sea
And here I am
A servant at dusk making houses of dirt
By the light of your fireflies

Dry Heat

I put Thursday in a jar
And set it on the on the windowsill
It was nothing more than standing water
Overcast and remembering

I was in a room with only one chair
Looking out through a barred window
There was a cactus with a single bloom
Ready to launch

How do leaves open and grow out of nothing
How do coconuts make their own sweetness from the sun
My shadow lay down on the floor
And said you’re boring

So I put on a sombrero
And watered myself
While out in the cactus thorns a guitar played alone
As the sunset melted cold

Just a Tuesday

This morning was full of deep breathing and filtered light
Rolled up in blankets assuming a half lotus
My heart wouldn’t cool down
It beat so hot
Smoke escaped the ventricles

What is the feeling of life
A dead television would say
It is waterfalls in your eardrums
And lusty pelvises
It is thirst

I found myself driving to the bookstore
Hoping to be soothed by words that don’t breathe
They would find their way into my mouth and melt under my tongue
They would sing like cello strings held over a fire
What’s wrong with being uncertain

I sat in a parking lot where someone was struck by lightening once
I thought of my English teacher from tenth grade
I thought of little girls setting the sky on fire
I could write myself into a corner
What would that mean for the future of morning doves

I met the reflection of a face like mine that would eat me alive
Tumultuous I hummed the way you look tonight
My neurons flickering like little pathways through the woods
Someone in the backseat has a knife
But he’s not really there
And I am unimaginably old

I made my way from shadows that gripped the road with old hate
To places where the trees parted and let me see the faceless sky
It wore a veil today and shone with memories of the sun
Suddenly I was showered in feathers and I thought the road was gone
Waves crashed in through the windows and I wondered
If strangers swam like fish in the sea