222

I dreamt she was a gymnast,

flung her pale limbs around 

squeaking silver poles, performing

frantic and impressive flips

forty feet above an audience of five or six;

but they are just done with their practice,

tying their shoes on the gymnasium floor.

Now she vaults, lands hard, breathes hard.

Hands on hips and eyes cast down,

She paces, murmurs, tallies--

Cold-faced and coaching herself like the girls I used to see

when the Olympics were on TV.

She's always been so tiny. Not frail,

but stubborn and bruised,

like when we were six and flung our skinny limbs around

in shorts, unaware that there

could be shame in skin and bones, 

or a need to conceal.

Now the nurses mistake her for his baby sister,

in her shorts and pigtails.

Blue vein-ghosts trail her pale legs 

as the cold keeps the blood near her skin.

We are visitors, and her smiles and gestures are frantic,

but impressive:

A story of a number that will keep him alive and okay.

She was pacing, murmuring, tallying,

And there it finally was: Their number, 

the call after the crash.

And there is no fear in his blood, she explains,

No shame in his skin and bones. She swears,

She'll bathe in it 'til her baby comes home. 

Prince Charming

She tried to move that morning with mystery, but the door just swung and clicked decidedly, so she vowed to replace them all with beads, or blankets, or tapestries;

and by tapestries she meant Wal-Mart sheets, but if she cut the tags her baby wouldn’t know.

She tried to scent her hair like India, but her shampoo smelled like red no. 4, blue no. 12 and fake gardenias, the cheap perfumes that make you sneeze. So she would pour the necessary liquids of clean living into jewel-toned vessels and glass decanters stopped with cork;

and by jewel-toned she meant the green glow that bottles of long-drunk grocery store wine hold, but if she hid the plastic and tore off the labels her baby wouldn’t know.

Her man’d hit her face and left in a rage with all the romance and tragedy of a Nascar race, but that was okay. If her cheek purpled it was just from eating too many grapes off the stems, then she’d held them out to him; her little prince, charming in Batman underpants, grinned and grabbed and let the juice run down his chin. And if she had it her way, it’d never be “just another day” again.

‘Cause if I can’t find my way, she thought, at least you’ll have broomsticks and candles, my baby, my baby boy. We’ll nab you a little cinder-princess, isn’t that right? She may be wearin’ rags but you’ll never let her think she means less than the brightest smile I ever saw on your face, the day I fed you grapes, the day I decided to let the damn fairy tale begin.

a concocted conversation concerning not conversing

"It's all about kids like you and me, honey. We don't need answers, we need the lion's den. We don't need someone to talk to, we need someone to make NOISE with. Don't tell me, I don't want to know. I want to figure you out by the sound of your steps in the attic when I'm asleep in the basement, I want to know you by the way you breathe right before you pick up the phone. Every second could stretch out and be a little longer--this could last forever. But people have to talk and talk and talk and date and drink wine and figure it out and lay it all on the line. And you know, I always thought figuring sounded like something you should save for math...you know?"

"Ye--"

"But I'll study you, baby, like the night before a final, I just won't figure you out. I was never good at math and answers don't mean shit, ya know?"

"Yeah...I know."

"Perfect. Even then you were talking too much. Now hush."   

Walking

Walking out to my car at night

My heart picks up speed. I don't know why.

Love is divine, 

And parties are fine, but I 

Delight most in just walking.

Dull parking lot ground; it could just be

A routine route to engagements mundane

No special thing, no crown awaits

Or kiss, or promise, or fame--

Just moving my legs to the

Buzz of my brain.

It is not an adventure. But I misunderstand. 

And my teeth taste the air, and I think something grand

Must be happening.

And it is, 

because my feet

can feel diamonds in the soil,

And it is because my hair can feel 

colors in the air, and it is because the wind

Wraps the back of my neck like a lover's cool hand and says:

This second is reason

Enough for a party.

An aside

If I say I'm doing one a day for 70 days, I should probably not begin by writing 5 in one day. But sometimes these things can't be helped. And they really were all written yesterday. So it's cool, right?

Yes, right!

Okay, thanks Self, I knew you'd be cool about it.

Back to poemy thingies next entry.

When life gives you lemons, squirt the juice in your eye.

And of course they made a new language. 

To keep secrets is hard enough

In a slippery, familiar tongue

And impossible, when some

Require restraint as briskly from 

the holder.

But to not breathe is to die, so these

Are rather rattled out through wire,

in code, 

In jumbled lingo, a mess

In flowers adorning clumsy confession

And he says darlin',

Everyone is a liar.

Apology

At 6:16, I went outside

And apologized to the birds

For damning them, every perfect morning.

Sad songs all at once, they did nothing wrong, they were just trying

And I cried for being so mean.