Transitions

First,

Sometimes at night, I sneak a cigarette
in the backyard, curse
the motion sensor
the God damn its between
bright-light; wake-the-neighbor’s-dog
and finding the switch in the dark.
It’s always in the same place, shoulder high
right inside the door
but my skinny bone fingers never
get it fast enough, with
the kitchen clocks counting
and the dumb mutt stirring
1 Mississippi, 2 Mississippi

Next,

There are the nights, I chain smoke
lighting the second, third, fourth,
with the red ember remains of the
one before it. Breathing in
and breathing out I know I am
until
the train passes, as it seems to do
from time to time
when,
I do the math in my head:

speed of train?

speed of barefooted,
cloud-headed country girl,
a half-lit American Spirit
and at least one smoke filled lung?

Yes, obviously.

Then,

On the train, fellow dreamers
tell me I am quite beautiful, I believe them
offer what’s left of my matches,
and as my hair grows long, collect
lavender from roadsides.

Finally.

Fault Lines in the Land of Oz

The attachment I once had to the things decorating our home
is quite suddenly, gone.

Today, I realized if flames found
the lovely juicer your parents gave us one year for Christmas,
that we used just twice, I definitely wouldn't weep.
I would probably forget we even owned a juicer
by the time I finished mourning the books
and the photographs. Quick, even that recovery:
I could do without the constant dusting of frames.

If we lost the clocks,
the ones you snuck onto the wedding registry
and we received instead of the wine glasses we needed,
I’d most certainly feel ambivalence.
Relief, perhaps, that for once,
your belongings were not constant reminders of my mortality.

Tomorrow, if the silverware, unassuming as it is,
or my great grandmother’s china,
even the nothingness of our cotton bed skirt
disappeared,
the burden of keeping a home would seem to me
ancient and forgotten.

I’m certain, someday; the ground in this sinking city will open
and the many things we’ve used to mark the passing of days,
will travel straight into the ocean. And,
I know, in the panic, those brief moments—
the shaking of a home turning quickly to rubble, I’ll reach.
Try to rescue the stuff that has so long defined us. And then,
I’ll remember that I don’t even like juice.

Found Poem

What if
I told you the opposite of happiness
is not sadness, but fear?
Lean into it.
I’ll rest.

Wait for you

on the sofa
tattered, creased with dog hair
and the weight
of at least one small child
in dust.

Wait for you

on the porch,
blue paint chips
decorating the bottoms of my feet.
and
mosquitoes bored by
little ‘ol me
again.

Tell me

Tell me.
What is that you’re holding
between spleen and sternum—
in the place your secrets used
to rest, parallel
to mine?
In the darkness,
what unraveling have you
hidden?
Tell me, shameful little one.

Gratitude.

Fall Back

“I think everyone deserves to have someone
be completely obsessed with them. You know?”

No

“Like psychopath obsessed,” she continues, “I totally get it.
I just want to wear his skin.”

Laugh

I don’t think she’s joking.

And I see myself unzipped—
sand, fingernails,
a backlit shoulder,
and the tailored seam
of my spine

I warned you

in a room far from a restaurant
that uses mason jars for water glasses
and makes its own ketchup.