"I Survived" (one of the 40 things to say before you die)

And she bruises, just like
Anyone else would do

And the conversations turn to kissing
in doorways and the merits
of vulnerability.

The prettier ones ask
the others what they want,

and they draw together
on mountain bound trains, burning
their life works on whim.
unashamed,
that their stories are told, freed
by the glitter-faced pop stars.

And she bruises, just like
Anyone else would do

And the conversations turn to kissing
in doorways and the merits
of vulnerability.

The Vapors

Few write of the opossum
double-wombed and nomadic
there is little romance in telling its story.

The women, with their Victorian desires
do not swoon, fall victim to the vapors
at first glance of the bare tail dragged about
the rocks and garbage, babies dangling from the
white beast’s fur. Their fainting rooms
have all but crumbled, painted over
at very least.

But, once the books have fallen from atop heads;
graces excused,
the corsets cut loose, and the bourbon nursed,
the opossums don’t write much about the women
either.

Come. Stay. Lose.

After all, is the world
not so beautiful?

Like that week I got a hotel room right above the pool.
And my room smelled like chlorine
and your skin smelled like chlorine
and we didn't care.
You spilled orange juice on my
computer, and for years, the space bar stuck
and after every word
I thought of [space] you. And that night

we tried to sneak into the park across the street
to watch the moon, and maybe kiss

but the gates were locked
so we settled for the field behind my house, and
laughed when the neighbors walked past,
because we knew they thought
we were [space] fucking.

Like that time the stars bent ‘round the mountains
crashed about the desert
and crept to your face

watched me dance
up the stairs, let it be known that
I would think of you;

but I would
not [space] wait, or count on them to
settle back into the caves
above.

Or that time
so many years later
that a man I did not know
smiled at something I could not see
asked me a question, and after every word
I thought of [space] you.

This I Believe: A Delta Manifesto

I believe
your suffering
is as real as mine,
and mine as yours.

Please be clear
in this distinction:
the suffering of which I speak
is not
the romantics'
tuberculosis, not the
absinthe laden or demon
stricken, syphilitic Paris
of the 1930's.
(Although, it should be noted
that if you had
either
or both
tuberculosis or syphilis
in the 1930's
I do not intend
to minimize your suffering.)
I mean simply to say
the suffering that quiets the
wild abandonment
of
your
true
essence.

I believe your suffering
is as real as mine, and
like love as an action verb
or struggle
wound
or pause-
in pursuit of dignity-
connectedness-
your suffering is
the most humane thing
you can do for me
and I, you.

Will they write of my home? (part 1)

When I am dead?
Will they even come?
Will they write of my home?
The same way one spoke of Frida Kahlo?
Of her home in Mexico City
and the gathering of her image

I; no heroine, salvation
undecided
rocks, not even,
pebble, sand or silt, cleansed.
Would they come?
Any of them? These four women
Would they write of my home?
If I were dead?

The whore with
Chagall; upright, mostly
“Freedom” and at long last
“Constraints”
The nerve
This night
Courage, at long last
the place we ventured
The room where
your hand rested;
Cells?

On the small of my back
as we scoffed at (ghost)
vases and such
“too ornate”
the pieces women kept
in their homes
centuries
ago. And now, it all
rests with me.

Would they come? Write of my home?
The women (you) and the pieces
stories, myself
buried in the backyard
Plastered and painted over?
The affairs
Picasso as bull (me)
romanticized. "Surrealists
played lots of games" There
are but twenty-six
questions.

Exclaim! Tucked in the
back of their pockets
in their back pockets
Beautiful
but not precious.
Be clear in that distinction.

Ache

On the rare day I forget you exist,
I breathe. I
can breathe.
Like that time I
shared with you the origin of the word
nightmare. The woman, beautiful,
and naïve in her own precious way,
drifts quietly to sleep
unaware, of the stallion
the beast on its way to her bedside.
Upon arrival, the Incubus, passenger
of said horse, dismounts, and
following the undressing of the beautiful
woman, begins at once to consume her
skin
tissue
heart
lungs
spleen
brain
bone
Rape, cerebral.
Dreams interrupted, battered
by the gremlin on her chest,
crushing innards,
breaking ribs
and suckling.
Yet and still, she readies herself
night after night
with blush colored rouge
and bright pink lips.

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.