Untitled #1 (Cherry Tree)

you have no mouth and I only wish it were so easy

to claim you in parts. remember the beating at your

doorstep? remember the bound feet at dinner? the beggars

asking for your magic for the night?

in this body there is more. in this body there is

holy spilling on the carpet. in this body there is

nothing I can promise you but teeth. add broken windows

into fact: spin your hips into a different story.

you are not mary. hold the veil open tonight; give thanks.

come home after dark with clean hands and

when the birds fly down to peck your eyes,

know you always deserved better than this.

mother may

I mother may I mother I went without permission

to the belly of the beast and lay down before

the fire to sweat out the evil of wanting her. i

can only grip the water so tight.

here is dead poets hoping to burn in the light

they drank themselves out of. we cannot rise from

the grave without being buried by the procession of

rings falling to the ground from fingers too corrupt

to find evil in the sand. so call them halos or infernos

but there is something in these matchstick bones, no matter

how they fall apart in your eyes.

our histories follow us home

and swallow us in our sleep. there is forgiveness in forgetting

in limited amounts. when the men come for the

fruit bearing trees, pick the cherries from your teeth

and crawl.

#college