before the storm, that top-heavy deridel
of sea-salt & bite,
before her skirt swung around her knees,
the waves slapping our faces, drowning our home, our spirits,
before we saw a tsunami dance on land,
we opened our windows, lifting, listening,
the locks as they clacked into place,
the squeaking twists of our front & back doors,
the screens propped open, held by cinderblocks—
before she could trot into our lives,
forcing herself through the small cracks
of chipped paneling,
those ever-present gaped crevices,
the ones we knew existed,
but never bothered to reinforce—
before the storm, that mad dash
of organic anger,
that flick of undulation, fear, panic…
it’s a reality that hog-ties the neighbors
& while they run around their homes,
their footsteps pound,
rivering to us through thick air,
the music is but a soundtrack,
the heavy, but delicate murmurs of an horror story,
the silent heaves of a chest that will soon stop beating
this mixed with the rough pulls of duck tape,
the “savior” of all american storms,
gives us comforts as we lie in the middle of our residence,
thin eyelids peeled back for the show,
tongues numbed with excitement, unmoving
& we breathe the fresh air of her encroachment,
its soft wetness both preface
& epilog
untitled
a metal log it is,
rushing, gliding, skating through time,
she is a generation of memories—
yet keeps such wonders to herself,
not even whispering to passengers
about the black-strapped boy on the tracks, his heart
pounding, telling him to hop
to the side, but adrenaline robs his senses,
shakes him like a friend, greedy, & yelling ready-or-not
here she comes
& she does, flying by barely missing him
at the last minute, & what of his playmates,
those cute, strawberry, mississippi girls,
the ones with pearled magnolias braided into their hair?
that southern drawl sweeping under
their feet, swoops over platted scalps like
double-dutch phone cords
& they all pause, laughing, when he catches
his balance on the other side of the tracks
it was close this time, sure, but not close enough
for their undivided attention
& the train?
she just whistles her chain-gang song,
watching it all, being steered straight, guided gently to the right, left,
that aged growl is the hum of her rigidity scoot,
an over-ground railroad song that she keeps,
undoubtedly to herself
Black Memories
The tight twists,
those right turns, over and over again:
Sprite bottles, Listerine, caps
or even door locks from inside.
Memories on sleep mode,
a shut down of Toshiba,
the silence before an alarm quakes,
the hush within pillow talk.
And the noise of rain,
the heavyweight pounds against the glass,
the knocks as if someone
BAM! BAM! BAM!
Hello? Who’s there?
Black Memories.
The calm as she slides
slithering into corner pockets,
pooling until desertion.
It’s me in the kitchen
finally cooking:
green peppers tossed in with reds
and onions,
that popping, shhhhhh ski ski, of olive oil.
It’s a sapphire, mental journal,
the tattered pages 1-1000: you coming home late,
brown hair messed,
brown mascara sliding south,
the ticks of seconds, tsk tsk tsk, as Fossil shouts, it’s over.
And that unforgiving smile,
the gentle ambiguous shake of your head, No.
The pull of pink lips.
The tight twists of silence.
It’s you handing me the knife,
the large, shiny one, the long
thick, black handle, the hush within our kitchen.
Vegetables sizzling, screaming
like lobsters for Old Bay, for zucchini, broccoli.
It’s you watching me, the quick,
shaking cuts of this, the thin slices.
That those eyes, they pierce.
A Black Memory.
Your coaled pupils urging, Just do it. Keep slicing!
I dare you.
to cut even after the zucchini, the broccoli, to chop
until silence is a hush and HUSH! becomes peace.
Closet Chatter
1
i remember a silhouette,
its slow kitchen-dance on dilapidated walls
& the rose hush that blanketed the air
i have the faintest memory of laying down colored pencils,
pushing my art du jour forward:
pausing
we played a game
a quick number where my eyes chased its zigzag movements,
where my heart expanded up, outward
rising like sunrise along incondite alleyways
it was a nippy par four
& for a moment i felt close to her
for only a split second
as tulips drew their lips in, and the fog on our windows
cleared,
the cement on which i sat shook
like it was going to open & swallow me
when it didn’t, the apartment seemed to warm,
though we hadn’t had heat all winter
2
i squeezed them in a past life,
those wolded hands, those fingers--
long and thin like fashionable skyscrapers
how they trotted off magazine pages
& danced a black jive in front of my face
hands:
still the color of a malted sunset
but now, midnight cracks
gurgle stubborn veins
& she thought she’d never get old
she really believed she’d live forever
a historical image that sticks
[too moving to let it move on]
a smell that follows you from morning till
perhaps her ashes will flutter,
winging free from the confines of this american urn,
perhaps they will catch a ride, hitchhiking,
settling on the broad back of time
3
therapy sessions are held in my closet,
where pleather thigh-highs hang their tags
on the wall behind them, the small font urging
me to give up squinting & look elsewhere,
where they stand upright and stare at me until
i begin to speak
twice a week we do this, & i lay on the floor,
the carpet both itchy and scratching
the boots point their tips in my direction
they jab without moving
they huff without breathing
so i close my eyes and try to breathe in her smell,
try to pretend like her feet are slipping into place,
her gentle hops stifling their mutters
& soon, i can hear the plastic ruffles of the pleather,
the grunts and curses as she rubberbands
boots over thick brown thighs
4
when i add it all up, the sum should configure hate
when the numbers crunch, their staccato punches
should produce an irrational product:
a figure that wont divide, wont multiply, wont add
just wont
when my lids curtain down and my lips purse together in anger
when my hands shake, those tiny ticks of unresolved business
when my left foot twitches and my thighs cringe in cramp
when this happens, i know to open my eyes, stand up
& get the hell out of the closet.