volume and density

You swim in me

as if I am two-thirds your earth.

A blue satin sea.

All in all:

The silent infant clouds

and sweet desert dates.

The slow peristalsis of the purple earthworm,

and the warm beat

of our blood.

You slip an extra ice cube

inside my cabernet. Watch the legs

lick the glass

as you trace my clavicle seam

to where I breathe.

I am The.

And the breeze.

And the oak tree’s leaves

that sip at the windows.

And we drink.

a neighborhood

Mosquito ticks against a glass,

no syrup had she slurped.

She slips against the cold rim last;

before she drowned, she burped.

Refrigerator festers with molded

Jam; berries mashed in fuzz.

The eggs all sit in sulfur folds;

the flies have lost their buzz. 

Slipped inside Egyptian sheets,

he tells her: it’s not you.

She sniffs her tears, saltysweet;

watches herself unglue.

 The public pool sinks with leaves

chlorine lingers stale.

Orangey rust smothers swings,

a football finds a nail. 

Cigarettes stained with lipsticks smear

library pristine cement.

The neighbors and the city fear

to watch their world ferment.  

time out

I nail a dusty mirror to the brick

above the trash and hope you see debris.

Your set of flawless black silk lashes tick

with a glassy stare that drills. And ices me.

And the rug in the hall is stained and painted black

with caked dirt, coffee, and gum and oil

from miles of shoes and years alone past.

Now: cast iron glares. Inside we boil.

Your steel toes kick. Gasoline and ink-

stained sleeves reach into my whispered waist.

I spin away. I let my shower think.

You step inside; let snowy soap erase

and replace with your kiss of cinnamon sentiments.

immersed in the billowing silvery steam, we repent.

the tooth dream complete with Jungian analysis

I bite into a youthful

toothless tomb.

My insides echo

with absence. 

My mouth

rusts into

ahhhhh

slick black gap.

The pearly petals melt

within my wilted gums

like lipstick

into waxy summer puddles.

And the tomato on the linoleum

is wrinkled rotten

and holed with mold.

And the paint is caked in yellow smoke.

The ovaries flee the autumn trees
and the orchid on the mirrored vanity

sheds its electricity.

I am the fly:

a desperate buzz

that licks at the beauty shit--

A tongue to own its onus;

to breathe its impossibility.

I am the conch

shell.

Listen to hear

the ocean of disowned.

the cradle

My eyes collide

into his horrific fish

shirt. The one that swims

with multi-colored

cotton carp and

the earthworm bait

they chase.

I trace a bisque thick stain:

an amber ring around his collar

and wonder

if he wishes for one

to encircle his finger.

I am twenty-one

years his junior;

while I gargled my first

speech,

he was sipping whiskey

with Aqua Netted women.

Our lifelines notched

us against a gummy wooden bar

where we order more

of the red wine and Amstel Light

that let him to kiss me;

a Pall Mall smoky make out

in the buzzing midnight parking lot.

His triangle of pepper

chest hair trembled.

And he loves me.

he slurrs

the words like easy

cheese

and plants his hopes

in my palms.

And this is how we grew.