A Girl Named

What the River Took

The present does not exist. Doorway         between two wor(l)ds that you         sleep in
sheets wrinkle and bunch unraveling          bones          the dust of us still singing. In          Out
was
         and was          we echo in this space this           collage of unbreathing beings.          Sunlight
pushes struggles against your          body          still positioned as an hour ago          Doors opened
but nothing steps through          It is          portal t h  a   t    m     o      v       e        s around
us.
All the pretty fishes motionless             above          your sun-shot head. So many holes
whistle deedle deedle dee          whistling the river          feeds          this summer feast yet some
still starve though           there is plenty to give.          The present is          a magician’s trick:
your
grace         melted gold seepingslippingspearing holes          where I am          forgotten
between the silent humm         (I)          ng w          (I)          res. Two hours slide through
you          same lovely form on auction          do I hear three?          You create my tag
verbal license plate sinking in          that stream from          the portal you          let          create
my hunger.          The future          diaphanous          wisp of hair. The past captured          in
a cracked bell jar
leaking delicate filigrees          silken lightning.          Tree of Life in its glass house
scorched by strands of          silver hair from your static          head          do I hear four?
Soon the moon and its tides will go          through you          the dust          not enough          to
stop my gaze penetrating          you          drinking that stream where my name begins          to
bob. Sun’s fool’s gold          laughing          mouth sinking          deedle deedle dee. Your lips give
birth          to zero          that seed bursting seconds:          our tree burnt-to-growing feeding off
wounds
          the umber sap dripping           your honeycomb head. Tears          now raising another
stream to collected and          distribute me          bones whispering           along the graveyard
ground of this gushing          river’s tread.

What’s New, What’s Left

I keep stray hairs, those

golden lines

pulled by comb and air

before you question my

disease, my

battle and bait that I cannot shed.

Casting a bone out, a shard

of fallen tooth

the fishing line gleams

as thoughts, yours-mine,

sink in

the containing stream

seams to

wound and stitch

but there is no thread left as

the hook cleaves the bed.

Discarded frames

flesh peeled, the silver stuck rings

still clenched chewing through to

loose another

net more tackle kept in storage

misused reused like fragments of

sand

castles which oblige the tide

allowing a splinter to live

inside.

I take wound hairs

so as to collect

dark debris

repurposing pulled out teeth

from my childhood trove

restringing

my arms, hands, feet

*

to lure

in

those ancients below…

the waters swirl, yet no

grave

nor you can keep me.

My lungs have turned to

dark wings

stuck spread in remembrance

of what flight used to be.

The creek

sinks waters lowering

as more leaves, clumped

organs

decomposing, are brought up

to breathe (their own stink).

Sunlight strings

cast here there here

ready to snag and snatch

wad(d)ing

forms not flesh or blood

but biting all the

same

living off living.

You call, throwing your

own cage

dried-blood wings crystalized

to meet mine, yet

nothing caught

and I will never answer

as I am trained to do.

Do not

knock on the glass,

feed my disease, fishes

upturned white

exposed bellies leaking

dripping beads of bone

better than pearls;

this oyster remains closed

its mucked tongue—

hidden

beneath the stream’s tar flow—

unhooked and silenced to

vibrations solely,

but I have already fed

my ears to it

to grasp

its tangle of fumbling teeth.

Splinters sunk tugging

ripped

from shining blond fibers

linked by my hand

knots

counting length depth

yet to acknowledge

wait … wait …

no just more muddy reeds.

You appear, disentangled

no longer clinging

below the veil of (we)ave

shredded—not to share—

returned

to carbon dustings

my reeled in, wound about

hook and line

cannot tear, taste, tease.

I have allowed the

digestion

and disintegration of

*

it (you?), though my

hair

still leaves its slivers

perhaps preparing for yet

another

fishing expedition.